


Fate of the World

by orphan_account



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2020-01-13 11:00:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 28,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18467590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: One day, aliens decided to destroy Earth, and things went downhill from there. A year and a half later, Torchwood fights back.





	1. Chapter 1

It was funny.

Well, no. Not funny. Not funny at all. There was no humour to be found in any of this.

But it was ironic.

Captain Jack Harkness had been saving the world from alien invasions for over a century, but the one time it really mattered, the one time it actually stuck, it was one he was in no position to stop. It didn’t come through the Rift he’d been guarding, it didn’t start in Cardiff where he was, and he didn’t even know who it was that was doing the attacks. The one thing he was supposed to be prepared for, and he was way out of his depth on all fronts.

As he stared out into the clouded morning, he found another irony. He shouldn’t even be here. The invasion had never been a part of Earth’s history according to his native fifty first century, and therefore its occurrence had irrevocably shifted the entire future. Technically, he will never be born. But being a fixed point in time has to be good for something, right?

He sighed, and wisps of breath curled into the cold, silent air. Five hundred and forty-three days of that silence had hung over Cardiff. It was still an improvement to the other twenty-eight days of screaming.

Of those twenty-eight days of plagued by terror and death, the destruction by a race known as the Fenedi had happened in exactly twelve days, four hours, and two minutes.

The most populous cities had been obliterated first; Istanbul and Shanghai had fallen within minutes. Whole countries had been decimated in days. Jack had never been fond of Germany after being stuck there in two wars, but he’d still been appalled to see it plundered and wiped from existence. China and Japan had gone the same way, although last he’d heard, America and India had managed to just barely scrape by. The entirety of the British Isles had fared slightly better, but not by very much. He last totalled less than a thousand people in all of Wales.

_“Any Sentries?”_

Toshiko’s voice through his comm cut in the stillness of the dreary morning.

“None that I can see,” he replied, scanning the skies as he kicks at the marred remains that of the roof of the Millennium Centre.

 Sentries. When the Fenedi had left Earth with most of the remaining human population, they’d ensured that those few left behind couldn’t get up to much. They had left large, cube-shaped machines that killed any human they found. Which not was not unlike another the drones left to scavenge Earth another time it had fallen (at least that time, it had been reversed, and left only in the memories of those stuck in its epicenter).

But the Sentries were worse than the Toclafane. They didn’t toy people, which was a blessing, but they also didn’t have vacillating personalities that could often lead to the escape of the victims. The most anyone could hope for from a Sentry is that they would shoot instead of blowing up the entire area. What was left of Cardiff had fallen to the Sentries, along with rioters and looters.

Most of the people who survived now lived in the Hub, because it was safest there. Sentries couldn’t find them; they couldn’t detect life signs underground. Unfortunately, that went both ways, because Tosh couldn’t pick up readings of Sentries unless they were directly on top of her computer, which made things difficult for two reasons: one, it was hard to guarantee the safety of those who went out to scavenge, and two, they couldn’t find a way to disable or destroy them.

Speaking of scavenging, they were running low on supplies. Feeding sixty-three odd people wasn’t easy. Especially in the midst of an apocalypse.

He caught something out of the corner of his eye, sulking around the bottom of the Millennium Centre, but it was too low to the ground to be a Sentry. He pulled out a pair of binoculars from his coat and peered in the direction of the movement. Just a cat.

“Cat.”

_“How big?”_

“It’ll feed… three?” They’d stopped being so picky about what they ate long ago. “It’s bigger than the one I got two days ago.”

He shot the cat from the roof and settled on picking it up later. A scavenging party could fetch it if he didn’t. The cat was not his priority. He was busy.

* * *

 

As he stared into the foggy mirror, he contemplated shaving. He owned a razor that Rhys once brought back for him after a scavenging trip, and with Jack’s most recent news, he figured that it was as good a time as any to shave. But shaving required a steady balance so that he wouldn’t slit his face open, and Ianto didn’t have that. Not anymore. And there were no chairs to sit down in inside the bathroom.

He picked up the razor and stuck it between his teeth and shoved the bottle of shaving cream in his pocket, and he reached around the sink for his crutches. All he needed was a room with a mirror and a chair, and that was what he set out to look for.

Finding Tosh at her desk, he stopped there first. Hers was the only one left standing, the rest of the monitors had been taken down and cannibalized for their parts. If anyone wanted to use a computer, they’d have to go through her to do so.

He made his way over to her, and she looked up expectantly when he arrived. She gingerly removed the razor from his mouth. She’d long since stopped yelling at him for carrying things in his mouth. It was just easier for him to use his crutches that way.

“Do you have a mirror I could borrow?” he asked. She could still have an old make-up compact in her desk.

“I’ll check,” she said.

“Thanks.”

She put the razor back in his mouth, and he went into Jack’s old office. It wasn’t an office anymore, really. Now that Ianto couldn’t climb down into the hole that Jack used to sleep in, they’d converted it to a bedroom that they slept in with Gwen and Rhys. He had told Jack that it was fine, Jack didn’t have to move out of his bunker for him. Ianto could have just taken room in one of the cells, like many of the other refugees had. Jack had told him that he wanted to do it multiple times, and eventually yelled at Ianto that he could make his own decisions, and that was what he’d decided. Ianto shut up after that, and they let Owen, Tosh, and Tosh’s cousin Akiko take Jack’s bunker. Not that Owen actually slept there.

Rhys was in the room, tying up their small cot. Gwen and Rhys had won rights to it when Gwen got pregnant nearly nine months ago. The shared, cramped room didn’t stop sex from happening, apparently.

“Morning,” Rhys said.

Ianto sat down on Jack’s office chair. “Morning.”

“Seen Gwen?”

“Not this morning. Try the kitchens?”

“Will do,” Rhys said, and he left Ianto alone in the room.

Rhys had a scruffy beard, too. He couldn’t shave anymore, not with the way his hands shook constantly. They’d had tremors ever since the second day of the attacks, when Gwen found him and took him to the Hub.  

Everyone had scars, mental and physical alike. Some were like Rhys. Others were like Tosh, with gashes and cuts, and some were like Gwen and Ianto, missing parts of themselves.

There was a knock at the door and it opened to reveal Owen. He quirked an eyebrow at the can of shaving cream and the razor in Ianto’s hand.

 _“Tosh said you were looking for a mirror?”_ Owen signed.

Then there were scars like Owen’s.

_“Did she have one?”_

Owen shook his head and looked around the room. He found the second office chair. He dragged it over to where Ianto was sitting and sat down in in front of him. He motioned for Ianto to hand over the razor and cream. Ianto frowned, causing Owen to roll his eyes.

“ _Just give me the fucking razor_.” Owen still managed to put the same acerbic bite into his words.

_“I can do this myself.”_

_“I know.”_ He almost looked apologetic.

Ianto handed them over, and Owen started to shave Ianto’s face. Normally, Ianto would be mortified by this sort of thing; he hated being reliant on others. But this was Owen, who had suffered as much shit as him. While Ianto was recovering from the loss of his right leg, Owen was learning to deal with the loss of his hearing.

It had been annoying at first. Ianto was in bed for a week as he was treated for his leg and subsequent hypovolemic shock, and Owen spent the entire time dropping things and slamming morgue doors to see if he could hear the sound. One time he asked Ianto to scream. The only thing it accomplished was agitating Jack, who came flying into the autopsy room at an alarming rate. Owen quit trying to test his hearing, and Ianto had half expected Owen to take all his rage out on him after that, but it never happened. Owen likewise never received any bitching from Ianto about his leg.

They still maintained their constant mockery of each other, but it’s no longer just mocking. There was always a subtle hint of understanding beneath it, a tacit acknowledgment of each other’s pain and loss.

Ianto flinched away as Owen nicked his skin. “Ouch.”

Owen frowned at Ianto’s lips and didn’t apologize.

 _“Careful,”_ Ianto told him. “ _That hurt.”_

_“Baby.”_

_“You’re an awful doctor.”_

Owen snorted and put down the razor. _“Done. Get the fuck out of here.”_

 _“This is my room,_ ” Ianto pointed out. “ _You get out._ ”

_“Arsehole.”_

He then got up off the chair and shoved it back in the direction it came from. It rolled and hit Rhys and Gwen’s cot, knocking it askew, and he nodded, evidently pleased. He left the room, taking the razor and shaving cream with him, and Ianto had the feeling that Owen was probably going to do something stupid with them.

Ianto felt his face. Weird.

“Hey,” Gwen said, poking her head in. “Have you seen-”

“Rhys?” Ianto finished. “Yeah. He went looking for you.”

“Oh,” Gwen said.

She had her hand resting on her swollen stomach and the other on the small of her back. She only did that when her back hurt, which seemed to be all of the time. Owen refused to give her anything for it, citing that there could be a time when someone needed it more than her. Gwen had agreed with him and accepted her pain.

“You look nice,” she said kindly. “All fresh and new.”

“I haven’t shaved since… well, since.”

“Yeah.”

They both sighed and thought of the things they hadn’t done in the past year and a half. There were lots of things Ianto couldn’t do anymore. Most of them were due to his leg, but some of them were just because the world had gone to shit. At least he could still make coffee. He’d have to remind Jack that they needed more.

“Jack say anything yet?” Ianto asked, reaching for his crutches.

“Not yet.” Gwen rubbed small circles on her belly. She did that a lot, too, but he had no idea why. Nervous habit, maybe.

“Well,” he said, standing up. “Let’s go and find your husband.”

“Tosh says Jack got a cat,” Gwen informed him as they walked out of the room.

“He said it could feed three!” Tosh called.

Ianto sighed. Cat wasn’t exactly his favourite, but meat was meat. That thought made him shudder. He’d nearly died on two separate occasions for that particular rationale.

“How long’s it been out there?” Ianto asked.

Tosh checked the time. “Ten minutes?”

“We should send someone out to get it,” Gwen said. “It’s going to rain.”

“We can get it when we go up,” Ianto suggested.

“We?” Tosh frowned at him.

“I’m going up there,” Ianto said. “I haven’t gone up in a long time.”

“If you’re going,” Gwen said, “then I’m going.”

“You’re pregnant.”

“You’ve got one leg.”

Ianto glared at her, and she glared back.

“Neither of you are going,” Tosh said.

“We’re going,” they both replied.

“Jack’s not going to be happy.”

Gwen started rubbing her stomach again. “He’ll get over it.”

“There you are!” yelled Rhys from the other side of the Hub’s main room.

He dashed across and up the steps to get to his wife. As soon as he reached her, he pulled her into his arms.

“Been looking for you,” Rhys said, sounding slightly out of breath.

“Been looking for _you_ ,” she replied. “Where were you?”

“You weren’t in the schoolroom,” Rhys said, “so I tried to find you.”

“There’s no school today. Didn’t Andy tell you?”

“No!”

“Andy,” Gwen muttered darkly under her breath. She shook her head. “Well, there’s no school. So here I am.”

After the first month of the apocalyptic nightmare, the team of Torchwood Three decided to use the Rift manipulator to shut the Rift to the best of their abilities, so there was no possibility facing another annihilation attempt by the hands of a different alien race. The team decided to split their talents to more useful things. Owen was still a doctor and Jack was still the leader of the base, and Tosh still kept a few of her jobs, but that was about it. Gwen became a teacher for all of the orphans they’d picked up. Ianto sometimes helped her, because he wasn’t allowed to do much anymore. He was allowed to sit and do recon with Tosh, though.

“ _Incoming_ ,” Jack’s voice crackled quietly into Tosh’s comm.

Ianto started to make his way down the stairs.

“You’re not going,” Tosh told him again.

“Yes, I am.”

“You’re not going, either,” Rhys said to Gwen.

“Don’t even try to stop me, Rhys Williams,” Gwen said, following Ianto slowly down the stairs.

“The least you could do is let us go first,” Tosh said, “so we can check the area.”

Ianto finished off the last step. He was still graceless going down stairs. “Jack’s already up there.”

“That doesn’t mean it’s safe,” Tosh reminded him.

“Look, Tosh, we’re going, and you can’t stop us.”

He’d only been outside once in the past year and a half. It was late one night when the moon was full, and Jack was too deeply asleep to stop him. He sat in the wreckage of the tourist centre and tried to remember what the world had been like before everything fell to pieces. Jack had joined him later, somehow aware that Ianto had left his side. They didn’t say anything, choosing instead to sit peacefully in each other’s embrace as they wished the world to repair itself. When they spotted a Sentry gleaming in the distant moonlight, they’d hurried back down to the Hub. Apparently, sometime later during the night, Jack had gotten paranoid and decided Ianto shouldn’t go out. When Ianto woke up the next morning, he received a stern talking-to from a not-yet pregnant Gwen and wasn’t allowed out again.

The morning’s cold air bit through his shirt. He wished he’d had some foresight to put on a coat, but he had been too busy making sure that no one left him behind. Everyone besides Gwen was faster than him these days, especially on stairs. And there was still a long way to go to get to Jack.

“Fuck,” he mumbled to himself halfway to the Millennium Centre.  

“You said it,” Gwen panted beside him. “Fuck.”

“Wish the invisible lift still worked,” he said, glaring at her. “We’d be there already if it did.”

“Sorry, but I had to stop you somehow!”

“Well, you inadvertently hindered yourself in the process. Good job, Gwen.”

“Oh, shut it,” she growled.

They eventually reached Jack, who was not pleased to see them.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Jack said, his voice dangerously low.

“Too late, I’m already here,” Ianto said.

 _“No,”_ signed Jack furiously, and Gwen and Ianto turned to see that Owen had followed them up. Now all three of the people banned from seeing daylight were outside.

Owen narrowed his eyes defiantly. _“You can’t hide me forever.”_

 _“I can try.”_ There was an angry spark in Jack’s eyes.

Owen pushed past the three of them, stomping over to Tosh and Rhys.

“Oh, very nice, Jack,” Gwen snapped.

She followed the fuming Owen over to her husband and teammate. It would have had more of an impact had she stormed off, but all the pregnant woman could muster was a waddle. And it left Ianto with a very mad Jack.

“Don’t even bother,” Ianto said when Jack opened his mouth. “I’m staying.”

Jack eyed him for a moment, and then sighed and started to take off his greatcoat. Ianto noticed a tear in a sleeve as Jack draped it over Ianto's shoulders. He’d have to remember to fix that later.

“Just this once,” Jack told him.

Ianto glowered at him but said nothing. It was not the time to argue that.

“You shaved your face,” Jack said. He reached a hand out and stroked a finger down Ianto’s hairless cheek, which sent shivers down his spine.

“Not me. Owen.”

“Owen shaved your face?” Jack asked, running his finger up the opposite way. More shivers.

“There’s no chairs in the bathroom,” Ianto reminded him. “Besides, I think it was therapeutic for Owen. A sense of normalcy. Normal people have to shave.”

“Hey!” Jack protested, and he removed his hand to feel his own smooth chin.

“Jack, you cannot convince me you ever thought of yourself as normal.”

“Oi!” Rhys yelled to them. “Get over here!”

“Looks like the cavalry’s arrived,” Jack said, his face breaking to his usual grin.

Ianto and Jack made their way over rubble to the fallen water tower as a large group of people loomed into view. They were all wearing worn out clothes and expressions, and some stumbled wearily on their feet. A few people were being held up by others, and there were children riding on the backs of men and in the arms of women. They were all quiet with their sad looks and weary eyes.

“How many people is that?” Rhys hissed to Ianto. “Do we have enough room?”

“We’ve still got space in the lower Archives,” Ianto mumbled back. “But we’ll have to stock up on supplies fast.”

But all worries about feeding and housing people were pushed aside as he saw who was in front, leading the pack.

“Good morning, nightingale,” Jack called brightly.

“Hello, you!” Martha Jones cried.

* * *

 

Owen’s eyes drifted from Martha to the crowd of people. He wasn’t good with numbers, but he could clearly see that there were at least a hundred people there. His instinct was to immediately rush over and check for broken bones or gaping wounds, because there clearly should be some of both. They looked like shit.

He shifted slightly to get a better look at one of the kids riding on the back of someone that could presumably be her father. Her face was pressed into the man’s back, and her eyelids were half closed. From what Owen could see, her pupils were probably dilated. Concussion, most likely. He’d have to check that out later.

He should have been paying more attention to Jack and Martha, but there was no real point. He couldn’t hear a damn thing they were saying. He watched their lips for a moment and wished he knew how to lip read. Ianto probably knew how to. That man learned loads of shit from Torchwood One.

After a tiring few moments of watching Jack’s overactive lips, he turned to Tosh. _“Translate?”_

She beamed at him. _“Of course!”_

If he had a choice, he would have asked Ianto. Of all the people who had learned sign language for him, Ianto’s sign was the best. Everyone else was alright, but Ianto’s hands framed everything nicely. Which was a little bit weird for him to think about, especially when Owen had just shaved Ianto’s face that morning. But in any case, Ianto’s hands were firmly glued in his crutches and he couldn’t sign unless he was sitting. Owen made a note to ask Jack to grab some underarm crutches for him the next time they went looting through an abandoned hospital. Ianto might have less of a range of mobility, but at least he’d be able to lift his hands and sign.

The others were still pretty decent at signing. Tosh and Jack had learned it the fastest, because Tosh was brilliant, and Jack had apparently had previous experience (Owen didn’t want to know why). But Jack was typical Jack and had an extravagant flare to his signing that got on Owen’s nerves sometimes. Rhys, surprisingly, had learned it pretty quickly, too. But his trembling hands distracted Owen. Ianto and Gwen had taken a while; Ianto because he was busy with his own recovery. Gwen just took a while, and she still had a hard time because she was missing her left pinky and had trouble signing a few things. Owen’s own broken pinky was a hinderance sometimes, but at least he could still sign ‘ _u’_ and ‘ _s_.’ And say _‘cow_.’

That left Tosh. Wonderful, amazing Tosh, who Owen absolutely adored. He couldn’t believe it had taken him so long to learn this about himself, and also angry about it. He, as a deaf corpse, no longer had anything to offer Tosh. He’d told her this once and she laughed at him and said she didn’t care.

Tosh was incredible. But her signing was sometimes too fast, and he’d often have to remind her to slow down. His brain, while pretty great, if he did say so himself (and he did), was nothing compared to hers. His might run a mile a minute, but hers was sprinting at top speeds. So, there was a lot of “ _Slow down! Too fast!”_ when she got excited. And her technobabble… he could barely understand it when it was in plain English, but now? She had to write it down most of the time for him to get it.

Her cousin, Akiko, wasn’t too shabby either. And she was a wonderful help in when it came to medicine; she often helped him translate for patients that didn’t know what the fuck he was saying. Owen was so grateful to Tosh for getting him such a good assistant. Not that that was why Akiko was there.

Owen remembered Tosh pressing a kiss to his cheek the day after he learned he couldn’t hear for shit. She had learned Milan had fallen, and she was worried about London, so she took her car to get her family. Unfortunately, she’d been too late, and only found her seventeen-year-old cousin. Owen hugged her as Tosh cried into him the next day and found himself wishing he could hear her cry again. He would have cried, too, if his body would let him do such a thing.

He’d taken Akiko under his wing, and he could immediately tell that Tosh’s brains ran in the family. Akiko was a bit less shy than Tosh, though, and she was great with kids.

Owen’s musing was cut short by Tosh’s fingers snapping in front of his eyes.

 _“Listen!”_ she chided, but her small smile betrayed her.

“ _Sorry. What?”_

She started signing stuff to him again, but he found himself zoning out again.

There was a woman standing next to Martha who hugged Jack furiously. Owen wondered what Ianto thought of that, and he peered around Rhys to see. Ianto seemed not to care and looked slightly interested in the woman himself. Owen pleaded to himself that it wouldn’t lead to a three-way. Sure, he didn’t sleep or hear, so there wasn’t any way they could disturb him, but he could still _see_. He didn’t want to go blind as well, thanks.

“ _Owen!”_ Tosh looked less happy this time.

_“Who is that?”_

She arched an eyebrow. _“T-I-S-H J-O-N-E-S,”_ she spelled for him.

_“Martha’s sister?”_

_“Yes.”_

He paused for a second to look closely at Martha. He watched as Jack and Martha talked and he realized something.

“ _She’s replacing me.”_

Tosh blinked at him. “ _What? No!”_

 _“Yes. Jack’s been wanting to throw out the dead doctor for a while.”_ His bitterness was probably showing. He didn’t care. He never did. _“Now I’m the dead, deaf doctor. Time to throw me out.”_

He didn’t see her reply, he was busy trying to catch Jack’s eye. When he did, Jack looked at him quizzically. Owen darted his eyes between Jack and Martha, and Jack frowned. Owen cocked an eyebrow angrily, and Jack’s frown turned into a warning glare.

_“Don’t.”_

_“Fuck you.”_ And just for good measure, he threw up a gesture that could be read by anyone.

Tosh yanked his hand down from the air. She didn’t look one bit pleased.

“ _That was wrong_ ,” she admonished, but he was already walking away.

Fucking Jack Harkness and his fucking need for obedience and perfection. It was no wonder Ianto was angry all of the time now. Jack locked him up for losing a goddamn leg. And Owen? Owen was a prisoner because Jack Harkness brought him back to life and because Jack Harkness lead him straight into the SUV. It was Jack’s fault, and Jack was making Owen pay for it.

Tosh steps in front of him and grabs his arm.

“ _Let go_.”

She looked him directly in the eye. “ _I know you’re mad, but don’t do something stupid.”_

He blinked at her.

_“Promise me.”_

_“I promise.”_

_“Good.”_ She stood on her toes and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

He gave her an almost-smile. It was the best he could do at that moment. “ _Leaving.”_

_“Where are you going?”_

_“Inside.”_ Where he belonged, according to Jack. “ _Going to get the medical room ready.”_

_“I’ll come too.”_

He shook his head. _“No. Say hi to Martha for me.”_

_“She’ll want to see you.”_

He jumped his index finger through the air. _“Later.”_

She visibly sighed and gave an unenthusiastic “ _fine_.”

That time, he managed a smile for her as he left.

* * *

 

Gwen tried not to groan as she shifted on her feet. Her back hurt, and her ankles hurt, and her head hurt…everything hurt. Maybe she was regretting coming outside. But only a bit.

“Alright, love?” Rhys asked her quietly.

“No,” she said, stifling another groan.

“I’ll massage your feet later,” he whispered.

Bless him. “I love you, Rhys Williams.”

He chuckled. “I know you do.”

She took one of his shaking hands in her own and stilled it. She’d gone racing when Milan was blown to pieces, like Tosh had, leaving Jack to deal with Owen and Ianto. Part of her felt guilty about that; there was every possibility that Ianto could have died. But the other part, the part of her who found Rhys passed out in their burning flat, was so damn happy she’d gone when she did, and also angrier that she didn’t go sooner. If she had, she could have saved him from whatever it was that happened. She was pretty sure he had hit his head, but she couldn’t get Owen to look at him, and Rhys shrugged it off. He told her he’d be alright, he just needed to clear his head a bit.

Gwen knew she was the lucky one. She had got her family back. Everyone else hadn’t been so fortunate. Tosh came back with her sole remaining cousin, and Owen had no one left to lose. As soon as Ianto had been lucid enough, he’d asked Jack to go to Newport to get his sister and her kids. Jack came back with nothing but empty hands. The only other time Gwen had seen Ianto break down like that was after Lisa. Jack himself had lost people. Late one night, when she was too tired to be asleep, she heard Jack whisper quietly to Ianto about a daughter and a grandson. She never mentioned it to either of them.

“Gwen!” Martha said excitedly as she walked over to greet them. “You’re… huge!”

Gwen frowned, then followed Martha’s eyes (well, eye) down to her stomach. “Oh! Yeah.” She’d half forgotten that for a second.

“Is this him, then?” Martha asked, gesturing to Rhys.

Gwen squeezed Rhys’s hand tighter and grinned. “Yeah, this is Rhys.”

“We need to get going,” Jack said, looking up at the sky. “We’ve taken enough time up here. The rest of the greetings will happen down in the Hub.”

“Oh, so you get to say hello to everyone, but we don’t?” Gwen asked.

“I’ve been out here all morning,” Jack said, “and now there’s a large crowd here. Sentries are going to pick that up sooner or later.”

“He’s right,” Tosh agreed, and Gwen gawked at her. She hadn’t noticed Tosh’s return. “Owen’s getting the autopsy room ready, so those who need medical attention can go there.”

“Good plan,” Jack said. “Lead on, Tosh.”

Tosh beckoned for the large group to follow her, but they didn’t move until Martha told them it was alright. Martha’s sister, Tish, also helped the group start its last short trek of their long journey by taking hands of anyone she could reach. Gwen was selfishly thankful they were all tired; it meant she wasn’t left in the back while everyone walked faster than she could toddle. She and Rhys got to walk at what felt like a leisurely pace for once, and Martha tagged alongside them. Jack stayed back with Ianto to help bring up the rear, but Ianto was having none of that.

“You should be up front,” she heard Ianto tell Jack from the back. “You don’t have to stay back here with me. I’ll be alright.”

“I _want_ to walk with you,” Jack said, sounding a touch affronted.

Gwen shook her head. Ianto seemed to have convinced himself somehow that Jack felt less for him than Jack really did. Gwen had noticed for over a year and a half that Jack was utterly in love with Ianto. He had been ever since he came back from Newport. But, whether it was because Jack never said anything, or because Ianto was afraid that Jack might leave him for any number of reasons, or because Ianto knew what it would do to Jack when he eventually died, Ianto shied away from true intimacy. Gwen thought the both of them to be idiots, and wished they’d just talk for once.

“So…” Martha said slowly to Gwen. “If I can ask…”

“Baby or finger?”

“Finger. But also, baby.”

“Got lucky with a Sentry,” Gwen explained.

“And the baby?”

“Lots of Jack’s condoms were expired.”

“Huh,” Martha said. “Well, that’s one way to find that out.”

“You’re telling me,” Gwen sighed. She looked at Martha. “And you?”

“Looter,” Martha said, touching the eyepatch.

“Sorry.”

Martha shrugged. “Lots of the kids think I look like a cool pirate, so that’s fun.”

“That’s sweet!”

“Yeah.” Martha frowned slightly as she watched Tosh lead her people. “Do you think I can ask about the rest, or…”

Gwen thought on it for a second. “Knowing them, they’d probably not want to talk about it, so I guess you’d have to learn from someone else anyway.”

“Tosh?”

“She was fine until she went to London to save her family.”

“Which day?” Martha asked.

“Second.”

Martha bit her lip, clearly remembering whatever had happened there that day.

“She went for her family and came back with one cousin and a face full of cuts,” Gwen said. “She said it was glass. Owen fixed her up pretty well.”

“And what about him?”

Gwen and Rhys shared an uncomfortable look. Nobody talked about what happened to Owen. Owen always seemed to know if they did, and then made their lives miserable until he forgot all about it. Which usually took a while.

“Bomb,” Gwen said eventually, sticking to partial-truths. “On the first day.”

“Oh, Owen,” said Martha sadly. “And Ianto?”

“That… well, if you wait a second,” Gwen said, “you’ll see.”

The walked in silence, until what was left of the tourist centre came into view.

“Christ,” Martha breathed.

“Another bomb the same day. Right outside the office. He almost bled out before we found him.” Gwen shut her eyes and tried not to cry. Stupid hormones.

But she could still recall Ianto’s deathly pale face as she and Tosh dragged him back inside the Hub. Tosh had to cauterize the wound, because Owen and Jack were gone and there was no response from either of them. The city was starting to burn around them, and all Gwen wanted to do was find Rhys, but she couldn’t because her friend was dying, bleeding out on the autopsy table. And the way he screamed…

Rhys rubbed her arm, chasing the nightmares away. “It’s alright, love.”

Gwen sniffed and blinked away tears. “Anyway, Jack’s Jack and he’s fine. Except for all the guilt he’s carrying for everyone, and that’s absolutely eating him alive.” And then she closed her eyes again because she was thinking about the cannibals. It felt like a lifetime ago.

“What’s eating who alive?” Ianto asked, and Gwen opened her eyes again.

Apparently, they’d dragged their feet so much that they were now in the back. Ianto had that face that said that he was also thinking about the cannibals. She remembered the knife to his throat… oh, god. Hormones.

“Gwen?” Jack asked worriedly. “Are you alright?”

“Fine,” she managed to croak as she fought back the urge to cry.

Rhys frowned down at her. “No, you’re no-”

“Shh!” Jack cut through.

“Don’t shush him,” Gwen started to scold Jack. “He-”

“Shh!” He pressed a finger to his lips.

There was a quiet whispering from above, like the wind quitely trumming around an open hole.

Sentry.

“Run,” Jack told them. “Run!”

There was a lot of panic from Martha’s herd of people as they ran towards the Hub’s entry. Rhys tugged her to a run, but she couldn’t do that very well. She wanted to scream at him to run on without her, but she knew in her heart of hearts that he wouldn’t leave her, and she couldn’t let him die. Not like this. So, she kept trying to run for him.

By some miracle of God (or whoever it is out there that keeps making shitty decisions for the universe), they made it through the entry and into the tunnels. People started to cluster there, and she yelled at them to keep moving! because if they don’t, they’d end up dead. Tosh, or whoever was up front leading, managed to get them walking down the steps, which was good. They wouldn’t all fit in the lift. Gwen lets people push past her on the stairs, because she knew how slow she was. She got separated from Rhys, but she told herself not to panic; it would all be over soon. She’d be safe in the Hub, and Rhys would be there too. It was all going to be okay.

When she made it to the interior of the Hub, there was still a frantic chaos bubbling up from the newcomers. Gwen pushed through people to find Rhys, but the people were pushing back, and she had to retreat for the sake of her baby. When she could muster the energy, she tried to stand on her toes to see something.

Martha’s voice eventually broke over the hysteria. “Everyone, if you could find your group of threes! Find your group and make sure they’re all here!”

Gwen didn’t know about groups of threes, but she knew the crowd was simmering down, and she could start to make her way through. She found Rhys near the centre of the throng. She practically threw herself at him.

“Oh, you’re alright!” she cried.

“Me? I was worried about you!” Rhys said, pushing her hair out of her face. “I lost you in the tunnels!”

“I’m fine, just slow,” she told him, and she wrapped her arms around him. He planted a prickly kiss on her head.

“Where’s Tara?” a voice called.

“Has anybody seen Tara?” Martha yelled.

“I’m here!” another voice responded.

Gwen turned to see where the voice was coming from and saw the cog door close behind three figures: Jack, a tall woman, and Ianto strung between them. The woman ducked out from Ianto’s arm to go join her group, and Ianto brought his free hand to rub his face. Gwen found strength she didn’t knew she had left to push back to the crowd to them. Rhys tailed close behind.

“You okay?” she asked, watching Ianto sink into Jack tiredly.

“Yeah,” Ianto said. “Fine.”

Jack didn’t look too convinced in Gwen’s opinion, but he said nothing. He only pressed his face into Ianto’s temple and left it there, drinking in the younger man.

“Where are your crutches?” she asked Ianto.

“Outside,” Ianto said. “With Jack’s coat.”

“That’s not important,” Jack said.

“It is to me,” Ianto replied. “I have to fix the damn thing.”

“Right,” said Rhys. “We can’t get those, so why don’t I help Jack get you somewhere?”

“I’ll be fine,” Ianto insisted quietly.

Rhys snorted. “You going to hop all your way to the room?”

Ianto didn’t respond, and Gwen gently patted Rhys’s shoulder. Sure, Ianto needed a bit of tough love now and again to get him past that pride of his, but now was not one of those times.

“Report the missing!” Martha called. She was met with silence.

“Oh, thank god,” Gwen said softly.

“Gwen?” Jack asked, sounding millions of years older than he was.

“Yeah?”

“Can you and Rhys help these people get settled?”

“Of course.” She’d really just like to sit down for a second, but Jack and Ianto looked even deader on their feet than she was.

“There’s still room in some of the lower Archives,” Ianto informed her. “Should fit at least five or six people in a room. Martha and Tish can move in with us.”

“Will we have room?” Gwen asked.

“We’ll make some,” Jack said. “Tish could probably sleep with Tosh and Akiko, and Ianto and I can move to the far back.”

“No, no,” Gwen said. “We should do that. Ianto shouldn’t have to move so far away from the door.”

“Ianto is right here and can speak for himself,” Ianto said. “You’re pregnant. You’ve got priority.”

“But-”

“Gwen, just… please go help the people,” Jack said exhaustedly.

Gwen wanted to protest more, but she could tell by their faces that it would only do more harm than good. “Alright.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Couple things:  
> 1: Editing? Grammar? Facts? Who are they? I wrote this, forgot about it, remembered it, and then posted it without rereading!  
> 2: Okay, I lied and did reread a few parts, and I realized that when I'd done a hasty revise of this chapter to take out five paragraphs of useless exposition, I'd taken a useful part out with it, and now I have no way of putting it back in. So I'll just tell you now. Why doesn't Owen talk? Because, and I quote, he's "got no breath," meaning he literally. Cannot. Talk. I'm fixing the bullshit they put in the show.  
> 3: Along those lines, they're using BSL to talk to Owen. BSL is a completely different language, and therefore has it's own separate syntax and all that fun language stuff. So, like any other language, I put it in the closest form in English for the sake of reading coherency.  
> Anyway, I hope you like it! If you don't, it's a rushed work that I made in three days a few months ago. If you do, thanks!  
> Have a wonderful day!


	2. Chapter 2

As soon as Gwen and Rhys left, Tosh watched as Jack grabbed Ianto and held him out at arm’s length, running his eyes up and down the length of Ianto’s body.

“I’m _fine_ , Jack,” Ianto said. “Really.”

Jack held him there for a second more, undoubtedly not believing him. But Ianto’s stubborn glare wore him down, and Jack nodded slowly. He kissed Ianto’s forehead briefly before looping Ianto’s arm around his shoulders again, and they very slowly made their way through the crowd.

For a moment, Tosh slipped back into her old ways and wished she had that. But then, with a smile, she remembered the time she came home from a scavenging trip with a black eye. Owen yelled at her for not taking better care of herself. It was all rather sweet.

“Are we sure they’ll fit?” Andy asked her.

Andy Davidson had joined them the first day after the attacks had ended. He’d managed to save himself and five kids. They had walked around the devastated remains of Roald Dahl Plass, screaming for Gwen Cooper to help them. It took Gwen an hour to convince Jack that Torchwood’s secrets were not more important than helping humanity at that point. After that, their doors were open to anyone that came through, as long as they could prove pure intentions. They’d had a few too many a thief run off in the middle of the night with vital supplies.

“Ianto says they will,” Tosh said.

“Not sure if we’ve actually got that much room in the lower Archives,” Andy admitted. “I think he was just making sure nobody would panic.”

“Even if we do have room, will we have supplies?” Akiko said. She’d left the autopsy room to join them. “Owen says we don’t have enough painkillers to give everyone.”

“We’ll have to go out tonight,” Andy said.

“So soon after a Sentry attack?” Tosh asked. Normally they would wait at least a day to go out again.

Andy shrugged. “It’s not like we’ve got much of a choice, now, do we?”

“I suppose not,” she said worriedly.

“Toshiko?” Akiko asked. “Owen’s looking for a pen and paper, so he can write down the stuff he needs.”

Tosh sighed. “What’d he do with the last ones?”

“He doodled all over those.”

“On my desk,” Tosh said, pointing. “Don’t give him the whole pad of paper, I can’t waste that much.”

Akiko ripped off a few sheets from the pad and took one of the pens. “Thanks!”

“Tell Owen to stop being a child!” Tosh called after her cousin as she ducked back down into the autopsy room.

“You should probably do the same,” Andy said. “Make a list, I mean. Write what you need down.”

“I’ll be coming with the group!”

“I don’t think so,” Andy said. “I doubt Jack will let anyone from your team go outside after today. Didn’t you see him?”

“I can take care of myself out on the field. There’s no reason why Jack would sideline me,” Tosh said.

“I dunno,” was all Andy would say.

“Hard to believe it’s still morning,” Martha said, appearing next to Andy.

“Hello,” Andy said. “Who’re you?”

“Doctor Martha Jones,” Martha said. She held out her hand, and Andy took it.

“Andy Davidson.”

“Jack says meeting in the conference room,” Martha said to Tosh.

“Thanks,” Tosh said.

“Right.” Andy clapped his hands together. “That’s my cue to leave. I’ll go keep the kids busy.”

Martha and Tosh watched him leap down the stairs two steps at a time.

“He was a policeman,” Tosh said. “He’s takes care of the kids with Gwen now. Kind of like a teacher. He’s good.”

“Huh.”

“Martha…” Tosh looked at the necklace on Martha’s neck. “I’m so sorry.”

Martha followed her gaze to the thin chain, and she reached up a hand to fiddle with the ring that dangled from it. “Thank you,” she said quietly. She cleared her throat. “I’ll go find Gwen and Rhys, you get Owen, yeah?”

Tosh nodded, gave the slightly tearful Martha an encouraging smile, and went to the autopsy room. Owen was standing in there, arguing with Akiko over something medical that Tosh didn’t know about. There was a kid sitting on the autopsy table, watching curiously as the two fought. Akiko rolled her eyes at something Owen said, and started rummaging through a cabinet, while Owen went back to the kid. Tosh leaned over the railing and waved at Owen.

“ _What_?” Owen asked when he caught sight of her.

“ _Meeting_.”

Owen made loops with his fist. “ _Wait_.”

He turned back to the child and stuck a plaster on his knee. Smiling at the kid, he made a shooing motion, and the kid hopped down from the table and skipped up the steps. Tosh waved at the kid as he bounded past towards her towards an older teen. The teen took the boy’s hand, and they left as the boy began to chat about wanting to be a doctor.

“Akiko?” Tosh called.

“Yeah?”

“You should come, too.”

“You sure?” she asked, following Owen up the steps.

“Of course!” Akiko had been to most of the meetings lately. Owen still had the habit of ignoring people, and _someone_ had to be around to take notes and translate for him. Tosh couldn’t do it all of the time; she had her own work.

 _“Have you got the list?”_ Owen asked Akiko.

Akiko nodded and held up the sheet of paper.

“ _Great,”_ Tosh signed. _“Let’s go.”_

The conference room was one of the few places not converted into something else. Most of the cells and Archives were turned into bedrooms, and the greenhouse had been expanded to most of the rooms on the catwalk, and the gun range became the kitchen somehow. Things like the weaponry, the autopsy room, and storage and electrical facilities had stayed due to their necessity, but Jack wanted one last true reminder of what Torchwood used to be like.

Martha was sitting in her spot, so she stole Gwen’s. When Gwen came in, she stole Rhys’s spot, and Rhys pulled up an extra chair. Ianto looked peeved by all of this, especially when Rhys shoved his chair over to make space for him. Owen and Akiko sat at the far end of the table as usual; Akiko because she still didn’t feel included yet, and Owen so he could ignore everyone as usual. He was already starting to doodle on the edges of his list.

“Well, Martha,” Jack said, “here we are again.”

“Part of me still hopes we can reverse it,” Martha said. “Like last time.”

Jack had told everyone about ‘the year that never was’ a few months after this whole thing began. Tosh found the whole story to be horrifying, mainly the parts where Jack mentioned he was tortured continuously. And when he told them how they all died. Firing squad was not how Tosh had expected to go.

“But this isn’t like last time, is it?” Jack asked bitterly. “ _He’s_ not here.”

“I tried to get to him,” Martha said.

“So did I,” Jack spat, standing up. He paced across the room. “But he’s not coming, is he? _Is he_?”

“No,” she sighed. She sunk back into her chair.

Tosh expected Jack to rant more about the Doctor, like he always did when the subject was brought up, but he took one look at Martha and deflated.

“So, what do we do?” he asked wearily.

“We fight,” Martha said with all of the resolution she could muster. “It’s the only thing we can do.”

“Do you think we haven’t been?” Gwen was sitting up as straight as her baby bump would let her. She sounded angry. “You think we’ve just been sitting down here, praying that some idiot in a police box will save us?”

“Gwen,” her husband warned.

“That’s not what I meant!” Martha retorted, sitting to match Gwen’s posture. “If you think the only thing I’ve been doing is pretending to be the princess in the dragon’s keep, you’re dead wrong.”

“Ladies,” Jack said placatingly.

“Don’t you ‘ladies’ us, Jack Harkness!” Martha turned on him.

Jack held up his hands in surrender. “Alright, alright. I just think tensions are running a little high. That’s all.”

“You’re the one who started it,” Gwen mumbled. “You and your bloody Doctor.”

“That man sure knows how to get on people’s nerves,” Rhys noted. “And he’s not even here.”

With the attitudes in the room, Tosh wasn’t sure if she’d want the Doctor here. He’d seemed alright when she met him with the Space Pig incident, but when the world had fallen, and they had needed him most, he hadn’t been there. Maybe it was for the best that he never returned Jack or Martha’s calls.

“Let’s just not talk about him,” Ianto suggested, and Tosh wholeheartedly agreed.

There was a small silence as everyone collected themselves. Tosh looked over to Owen, who was still doodling on his list. He probably hadn’t payed any attention to what Akiko had translated for him.

“How safe is this place?” Martha asked abruptly.

“Pretty safe,” Jack said. “Why?”

“Just wondering. I walked here from London with a hundred and thirty-five people and now I have ninety-eight,” she said. “I just want to make sure they’re safe.”

“Bombs can’t break through the surface,” Jack said. “It’d take a bomb from the inside to blow this place up.”

“Comforting.”

“They won’t get in,” Jack assured her. “They don’t know we’re here.”

Martha bit her lip and nodded.

“Why?” Jack asked again.

“What do you mean ‘why?’ I just told you.”

“I know that face,” Jack said. “You’re planning something.”

She didn’t respond.

“What is it, Martha?”

“Look, I didn’t want to say anything,” Martha began. “I don’t want to get your hopes up or cause you any danger.”

“Martha…”

She sighed. “Look, before the last of UNIT fell, we were working on something. Something big.”

“This better not be Project Indigo.”

“How’d you know about tha- oh, who cares. It’s not.”

 “Then what?”

“We thought- we _thought_ ,” she emphasized, “that there was a way to destroy the Sentries. For good.”

“What? How?” Jack asked. “Bullet’s don’t work, fire doesn’t work, alien tech doesn’t work. Trust me, we’ve tried.”

Martha shook her head. “That’s because you can’t take them down individually.”

Jack folded his arms. “Go on.”

“When the last UNIT base was still up and running, we were scanning the area, trying to get readings on individual Sentries,” she explained. “We just kept searching higher and higher into the atmosphere out of desperation when we found something. It was up in the thermosphere in a stationary orbit over London. We got some readings back… and they weren’t anything man-made.”

“But how?” Tosh heard her own stunned voice asking. “We’ve never been able to get a lock on anything Fenedi.”

“I don’t know,” Martha said. “We were bombed before we could get anything more. The base was far less secure than this.”

“You want us to scan for them,” Gwen said.

“This is why I didn’t want to say anything,” Martha said. “We’ve finally found someplace safe to scan, but… it could cost everyone their lives.”

“We’ll do it,” Ianto said.

Gwen turned to him. “But-”

“But nothing,” Ianto said. “Whatever this is could be our chance to end this. For good.”

“We have lives to think about,” Gwen protested.

“She’s right, mate,” Rhys agreed.

“And how good is your life?” Ianto asked. “No, really. How wonderful is living in the Hub, fearing for your life? How great is it to live without ever seeing the sunlight?”

Tosh gave a quick glance over to Jack. It was no secret that Ianto was pissed at Jack for being left behind all of the time. But Jack’s face showed no trace of remorse as he looked at his lover.

“He’s right,” Jack said.

Gwen glowered at him. “Jack-”

“We’re doing it,” Jack said, his face still a mask. “Tell us what you need, Martha.”

Martha looked at Tosh. “What do you have for equipment?”

Tosh snorted. “Better than UNIT’s rubbish, that’s for sure.” She blinked. “Sorry, that was insensitive.”

“It’s fine.”

“Was there anything in specific you used?” Tosh asked. “Alien tech, classified tech…”

“I don’t know,” Martha said honestly.

“That’s not much help,” Ianto said dryly.

“Look, I’m a doctor, okay?” Martha said. “I might be smart and all, but I’m generally doing doctor-y things. I wasn’t in the room.”

“Is there someone who was?” Tosh asked.

“Yeah. Tommy,” she replied. “One of our three remaining soldiers. He was guarding the door. You can ask him; he might know.”

“It’ll have to do,” Tosh said, trying very hard not to think of another soldier named Tommy.

There was a slapping noise that caused Gwen and Martha to jump. Tosh sighed and looked over at Owen, who was smacking at the table. She’d told him hundreds of times that a simple wave would be enough to get anyone’s attention, but it was to no avail. Owen was Owen, and annoying was what he strived to be.

“ _What_?” Jack asked.

“ _We talking about supplies?”_ Trust Owen to miss the entire point of the conversation. Akiko put her face in her hands.

_“No. Why?”_

Owen waved his list in the air, and Jack went over to have a look at it. Jack began questioning about certain items on the list, and Owen rolled his eyes at Jack’s lack of twenty first century medical knowledge.

“How’d you guys get so good?” Martha whispered quietly across the table to Tosh and Gwen.

Gwen shrugged. “Tosh’s just good at finding things and teaching them.”

“You’re giving me too much credit,” Tosh said. “I just created a programme based on BSL that would help teach you.”

“It took a while to learn, but we did it,” Gwen said. “Well… I’m still slowly making my way through, but I’m getting there.”

“I know a few signs, but that’s it,” Martha said. “I can say _cat_ and _dog_.”

“Oh no. We left the cat outside,” Tosh groaned, remembering the cat Jack shot earlier.

Gwen and Martha ignored her and kept talking, and she tried to track Owen’s and Jack’s conversation to see when she could jump in to mention the cat. Ianto had joined in and was signing quite vehemently about something. Tosh caught sight of something about crutches and Ianto referring to them as ‘ _those stupid things.’_ Why were they talking about crutches?

Owen caught sight of her frowning and frowned back. Jack saw them both frowning and joined in, as did Ianto. The four of them sat frowning at each other. Tosh sighed. Men.

“ _We forgot the cat.”_

 _“Cat?”_ Apparently, nobody had told Owen about the cat.

“ _We’ll get it later.”_ Jack signed.

Tosh’s frown deepened. “ _You can’t be going out already!”_

 _“We don’t have a choice._ _Ianto needs his crutches and we need food.”_

 _“And medicine,”_ Owen added.

 _“And medicine,”_ Jack repeated.

“ _I’m going,_ ” Tosh signed, remembering her earlier conversation with Andy.

Surprisingly, it was Owen that answered, not Jack. “ _No.”_

“ _Why not?”_

 _“It’s dangerous.”_ It was Jack’s turn to deny her.

_“I can take care of myself.”_

_“You’re not going.”_ Jack had a steely glint in his eye that stopped her from arguing.

“ _Fine.”_ She signed it as angrily as possible so that they knew it wasn’t fine at all.

“Rhys,” Jack said aloud, because Rhys wasn’t paying attention to their conversation. “You and Andy go check the stocks. Figure out what we need.”

“Now?”

“Now.”

Rhys stood, and Gwen got up with him.

“Put your chair back,” Ianto told him.

Rhys did as he was bid. He took Gwen’s hand and they left.

“Right, I suppose I should take you to Tommy, then,” Martha said to Tosh.

“Lead on.”

* * *

 

Ianto and Jack were the only two people left in the conference room. Jack was gnawing on a thumbnail, something Ianto had to constantly tell him to stop doing. Ianto allowed it, just this once.

“She’s going to go anyway,” Ianto said. “You’re not going to stop her.”

“What is it with you people and disobeying my orders today?” Jack asked.

“Maybe if you didn’t give such crap orders…”

“I’m sorry for trying to keep you alive,” Jack snapped.

“I’m going to die someday, Jack,” Ianto sighed. “You can’t stop that.”

“But does it have to be so soon?” Jack asked. “I could have lost you today, Ianto.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Ianto said for what felt like the thousandth time that day.

“You might not have been.”

“But I am.”

“Ianto.” Jack crouched down and stared him directly in the eye. “Ianto, please. For me, just… stay inside, okay? Stay safe.”

“I will if you will,” Ianto said, folding his arms.

“What?”

“I’m not-so-subtly telling you not to die.”

“I haven’t died in three weeks,” Jack said.

“Oh, good job! You get a gold star,” Ianto said dryly.

“Ianto-”

“Jack.” Ianto said.

They were sitting very close, and that was the most privacy they’d had in weeks. The anger in Jack’s eyes was clearly transforming into lust. Ianto could feel Jack’s breath and he could smell those damn fifty first century pheromones. Hell, he could practically taste them; his body was begging for them. Jack’s lips crashed into his and his first thought was _did we lock the door?_ and the second was…

“Mr. Ianto?” a voice called as the door swung open. “Captain Jack?”

 _Fuck_.

They always forgot to lock the door.

“Yes, Tristian?” Ianto asked, trying not to groan in frustration. Jack gave him the dopiest grin and Ianto wanted to slap him.

“Mr. Rhys sent me to tell you they have questions about their inventory,” the boy said, utterly oblivious to what was happening. Either that, or he’d seen so many sexual encounters in the past year in the packed space that he was unphased by it.

Jack’s grin slid from his face, and he sighed and pressed his forehead to Ianto’s. “I’ll be there in a second.”

“Yes, sir.” But Tristian didn’t move.

“Tristian?” Jack asked, turning to face the boy. “You can go.”

“They told me that I wasn’t allowed to come back without you,” Tristian informed him.

Ianto’s groan escaped him that time and he let his head fall onto the back of the chair.

“Alright,” Jack said tetchily. He looked down at Ianto.

“Go,” Ianto said, waving him away. “I’ll sit here until you get back.”

“That’s going to be a while.” Jack grinned and bounced on the balls of his feet lightly. “I could carry you.”

Ianto sat up quickly. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Tristian, do you think I should leave Mr. Ianto here to sit all day, or should I carry him out?”

“Carry him,” Tristian said earnestly.

“Two to one,” Jack said.

“Oh, god,” Ianto said, knowing there was absolutely nothing he could do to stop it.

Ianto closed his eyes, absolutely mortified, as Jack scooped him up and cradled him in his arms.

“Always wanted to do this,” Jack huffed.

“This isn’t the most efficient way to carry someone,” Ianto notified him.

“Would you rather I lifted you in a fireman’s carry?” Jack asked.

“…no.”

“Then shut up.”

Ianto crossed his arms and glared up at Jack.

“Alright, Tristian,” Jack said. “We’re going.”

No one batted an eye when they saw Jack carrying Ianto. He couldn’t tell if purposefully not staring was worse than staring. Jack dropped him off on the sofa behind Tosh’s chair and planted a kiss on his forehead before bounding off to find Rhys and Andy.

Three children found him there: Isaac, Max, and Mason. The youngest, Mason, was three, and his brother, Isaac, was six. Max was five and he rarely left the other two’s sides.

“Read, please?” Mason asked, holding up a small pile of children’s books.

“Alright,” Ianto said.

He spent an hour reading to the boys. Isaac fell asleep in his lap halfway through, so he held onto him when the older boys left to play. That was how Ianto spent life now. Playing nanny. He ran his fingers through the sleeping boy’s hair, wishing for the old days. Back when he could clean the Hub or go Weevil hunting. Or do anything fun.

That evening, the scavenging party went out. Jack and Tosh had one last argument before Jack caved and let Tosh come. All around, there were people saying hasty goodbyes to each other. Gwen pressed kisses onto every last inch of Rhys she could reach, and Akiko held tightly onto her cousin. Andy’s boyfriend kissed him passionately. A pair of adult twins hugged their mother, promising her they’d be back soon. Ianto said a hasty goodbye to Martha from the sofa, because she was going out to learn the ropes with Jack. Her sister Tish clung to Jack for a minute or two. The two UNIT soldiers who were not Tommy said nothing to anyone.

“I’ll be back later,” Jack told Ianto, kissing the top of his head. He lingered there for a moment before pulling back and giving a sad, crooked smile.

How much later was never certain. Some nights, it took a few hours. Others, the party was gone the entire day. Those were always the worst to sit through, because there was no telling if they were just slow hauling things back or if they’d all died. That had happened once. They lost three people and Jack didn’t say anything for two days.

On that night, most of the waiting people went to bed by midnight. Ianto found himself sitting in Tosh’s chair, unable to even think about sleep. Owen, who couldn’t sleep, joined him with Gwen.

“ _Akiko_?” Ianto asked Owen. She usually joined when Tosh was out.

“ _Asleep.”_

That was the only thing that was said that night.

Early the following morning, there was no sign of the party. Gwen had fallen asleep on the sofa, and Owen had started to doodle all over Tosh’s notepads. Owen had become quite good at drawing lately. He did a lot of things now that he had an immense amount of time on his hands and an actual excuse to ignore people. Like shaving off Gwen’s left eyebrow once. Or cutting a hole in all of Andy’s socks. Or doodling lots of porn on the bathroom mirrors. Owen was a menace. Ianto respected that. Especially now that he didn’t have to clean up after Owen’s messes.

When Owen had transitioned from drawing normal things to just straight up cocks, Ianto stole the pen from him.

“ _Tosh won’t like that.”_

_“Fuck you.”_

_“Jack wouldn’t like that.”_

Owen rolled his eyes and sat back in the office chair. His eyes shifted around the silent Hub, looking for something to do. He stood up and wandered down to the autopsy room without saying what he planned on doing. Ianto suspected more graffiti. Akiko was going to have a fun time cleaning that off.

“Ugh,” Gwen moaned from the sofa. “Who let me fall asleep here?”

“It looked like you could use it,” Ianto said.

She slowly made her way to a sitting position. “Christ. Everything hurts.”

“Sorry.”

“Where’d Owen go?” she asked, looking at the doctor’s vacant seat.

“Probably to make Akiko’s day a living hell. Can I interest you in a picture of a cock? Owen drew it.”

“Oh, lovely,” she said. “I think I’ll pass.”

“I could just leave these here,” Ianto mused. “All this paper. I don’t have to clean it up. I’ve been given a free pass from cleaning for my entire life.”

“No more cleaning for Ianto Jones.”

“That’s right.”

There was a pause.

“It’s bothering you, isn’t it?”

“Yep. Hand me that bin.”

There was a strange screeching noise that came from the autopsy room. Gwen and Ianto exchanged a glance.

“It’s your turn to stop him,” Ianto said.

“Do I have to?”

Ianto pointed to his stump of a leg.

“That is so unfair.”

“Well, if you’d like, I could chop yours off, too.”

Gwen smiled, but it slowly faded from her face. “Ianto, when was the last time you were happy?”

“What?” he asked. What kind of question was that?

“When was the last time you were happy? And I mean actually happy, not just putting on a show.”

He thought about it for a few seconds. “I don’t know.”

“Me neither,” Gwen said.

“I suppose we’re just trying our best to survive,” Ianto said. “Happiness isn’t a factor anymore.”

“It _should_ be.”

“I know. But the world doesn’t work on ‘should’ and ‘shouldn’t’ anymore.”

“I miss my life,” Gwen said. “I miss my flat, my bed. I miss Rhys cooking lasagna. I miss my finger.”

“I miss being able to clean up,” Ianto said. “And that’s sad.”

She stood up and grabbed him the bin. “Have a go at it.”

The door to Jack’s office opened, and Ianto turned to look at it. He expected it to be Akiko, but it was Tish Jones.

“Good morning,” Ianto said to her, hastily shoving the pornographic drawings into the bin.

“Morning,” Tish said, her eyes flitting between the two of them.

“Normally, I’d offer you coffee, but I’m afraid I’m a little indisposed at the moment,” Ianto informed her. “I’ll make you some as soon as I can.”

“That’s alright,” she said. “You don’t have to do that, I could make my own.”

“Don’t be silly,” Gwen said. “Only Ianto makes the coffee. Unofficial official rule.”

“Oh.”

Gwen set the bin down and waddled back to the sofa. She slowly lowered herself down, and then patted the space beside her. “Come sit! Keep us company while we wait.”

Tish sat down, perching herself a cautious distance from Gwen. Ianto watched Gwen go through a wide arrange of her ‘mother-hen’ emotions, undoubtedly wanting Tish to scoot closer.

“Are they back yet?” Tish asked.

“No,” Ianto said. He tried not to speculate what that could mean. If he lost Tosh and Martha… No. Best not to think about it. “But they will be. Soon.”

Tish didn’t look convinced.

“So, Tish,” Ianto said amiably. “Tell us about yourself.”

‘Tell us about yourself’ used to mean ‘what kind of job do you have?’ or ‘do you like cats or dogs? Or both?’ and ‘what’s your favourite colour?’ Now it just meant ‘how many people have you lost?’ and ‘are we in danger of losing you, too?’

“There’s not much to tell,” Tish said, shrugging.

Not a good start.

“I lost my parents, but I’ve still got Martha.”

Better.

“And I’m happy to see Jack.”

There. That’s good.

“He’s happy to see you, too,” Ianto said, giving her a small smile. She looked like she could use one.

“It’s funny how we always end up meeting during the end of the world,” Tish said glumly. “I’m just glad he’s not dying all of the time this go around.”

Ianto looked at the floor. He looked at the wall. He looked at the ceiling. He looked anywhere but Tish. He didn’t want to think about Jack dying. Not when it was entirely possible that Jack could be dead at that moment.

He used to hold Jack when Jack died and came back. He’d gently pull Jack’s head onto his lap and whisper nice, quiet things, and he always held on tight. That way, when Jack gasped back to life, he’d be right there, soothing Jack back to existence. He couldn’t do that anymore. Nobody was there for Jack when he came back; Jack always woke alone and scared.

“He used to talk about you guys all of the time,” Tish said. “I met you once. Well, not really ‘met.’ I got to watch as you died.”

Okay, it was starting to sound not very good again.

“Right,” Ianto said, shoving thoughts about his counterpart’s drowning out of his mind.

“Sorry,” she said quietly.

“That’s alright, sweetheart,” Gwen said, even though it wasn’t. Ianto could tell she was thinking about the other Gwen being shot in the face.

There was another screeching noise. Gwen sighed and Ianto twiddled his thumbs.

“What was that?” Tish asked.

“Oh, that’s just Owen,” Ianto said placidly.

Akiko came hurrying out of Jack’s office. Ianto always liked to think that Akiko knew exactly when Owen got into trouble. An Owen-alarm. Seemed to run in the Sato family.

“He’s down in the autopsy room,” Gwen said.

“If I have to reshelve everything again…” Akiko muttered as she rounded the corner down to the autopsy room.

“She sound like anyone you know?” Gwen asked Ianto.

“Better her than me,” Ianto replied.

Akiko’s shriek echoed through the Hub. It probably woke anyone still sleeping in the cells.

“I bet you a glass of the wine I’ve got stashed that it _was_ the shelves,” Gwen said.

“I bet you a bar from Myfanwy’s old chocolate horde that it was spray-painted porn again,” Ianto countered.

“Deal.”

“Akiko?” Ianto shouted. “What was it?”

“DICKS!”

“I’ll let you know when I want that wine,” Ianto told a glowering Gwen.

“Does… does this happen a lot?” Tish asked.

“Depends on what kind of mood Owen’s in,” Ianto said.

“Remember when he-”

But whatever Gwen wanted Ianto to remember was cut off. The cog door had started to roll open, and she was trying to get to her feet as fast as she could. Tish was already charging down the stairs.

Even when he had the ability to, Ianto never would have _ran_ to Jack. He wouldn’t have thrown himself at him the way Tish was, or held on the way Gwen was clutching Rhys. He would have simply walked over, asked Jack politely if he was alright, and then helped him in any way he could. Now that he didn’t have the option of doing any of the aforementioned things, he kind of felt cheated. The stupidly romantic side of him would have rather enjoyed bounding over to Jack, shoving the box from out of his hands, and kissing the daylights out of him. But he couldn’t, so he didn’t.

Tish let go of Jack and went to throw herself at her sister. Ianto waved at Jack, and Jack dashed up the steps to him. He slammed the large cardboard box down on Tosh’s desk and knelt down in front of Ianto. Lacing his fingers together, he placed them under his chin and on top of Ianto’s remaining knee.

“Hey,” Jack said, grinning. “Did you miss me?”

* * *

 

Ianto snorted. “What, were you gone?”

But he reached down and smoothed out Jack’s hair, smiling that small smile that Jack thought the world of.

“Got you something,” Jack said.

“Oh no.”

“Hey, not all my gifts are bad!” Jack said.

“Unless it’s a pizza, I don’t want it,” Ianto deadpanned.

“It’s better than a pizza,” Jack said. He moved his hands and gave a light kiss to Ianto’s knee.

“What is it?”

Jack stood up and dug through his box. “Thought you’d like something else to read other than your old reports.” He handed Ianto the books.

Ianto read the titles, raised an eyebrow, and looked up at Jack. “Really?”

Jack would’ve been crestfallen if not for the tiniest hint of Ianto’s grin. “Come on, don’t tell me you’ve gone off Tolkien.”

“Would you believe me if I said I had?” Ianto handed the books back to Jack.

Jack placed the books on Tosh’s desk. “Not for a second.”

“So, I take it that it went well, then?” Ianto asked, a trace of concern in his voice.

“Yeah. Everyone’s okay.”

“Get everything you need?”

Jack shook his head. “There’s not going to be enough food. We’ll have to go again. Soon.”

Ianto nodded solemnly. That was one of the things Jack loved about Ianto. He always understood. He might not always agree, but he understood.

“Did you get the cat?”

“No. Taken off by something.”

“Coat?”

Jack pulled a sleeve out of the box to show Ianto. “And Tosh has your crutches.”

“Good. I would very much like to stand up.”

“How long have you been sitting there?” Jack asked.

“All night,” Ianto said.

“We can go for a walk later,” Jack said.

“Outside?” Ianto asked hopefully.

Jack felt his heart drop at the thought of that. “No. Not after what happened yesterday.”

Ianto sighed but said nothing more.

“Ianto!” Tosh said.

She was carrying three boxes, balanced precariously and only held in place by her chin. She was carrying Ianto’s crutches underneath one armpit, and a blanket beneath the other.

“Here,” she said, shoving the boxes at Jack.

Jack barely caught them before they fell. “Careful, now. Don’t want to lose the soup.”

“More canned soup?” Ianto asked, not bothering to mask his disapproval.

“Yep.” Tosh placed the blanket on top of the boxes. She held out the crutches to Ianto, who took them. Her eyes wandered to her desk. “…Owen.”

Jack glanced over and saw the almost non-existent notepad, and Tosh took off down to the autopsy room.

“Just wait until she sees what’s waiting down there,” Ianto grunted as he stood up.

“What is it this time?”

“Nothing that Akiko can’t handle,” Ianto said. “At least he’s stopped taking it out on himself.”

“Hmm.” Jack absentmindedly kissed Ianto’s forehead.

“You should talk to him,” Ianto advised. “This all started when he got pissed at you yesterday. And then Gwen, because I think she’s depressed, and your Tish might be too.”

“Yeah,” Jack sighed. He placed a hand on Ianto’s cheek and stroked his thumb over Ianto’s cheekbone. He’d missed clean-shaven Ianto. “What are you going to do?”

“Coffee,” Ianto said. “People should be starting to get up soon.”

“Make me a cup?”

Ianto smiled. “Always.”

Jack cupped his hands around Ianto and kissed him once, twice, and again on the forehead for good measure. It might have been more public displays of affection than both of them were accustomed to, but he just… he just needed it.

Down in the autopsy room, Jack found Tosh rebuking a very unapologetic Owen. Akiko was busy draping a sheet over two cabinets. Jack wondered what kind of graffiti it was that time. Oh, who was he kidding, it was obviously going to be a dick. Unless it was a vagina. But most likely a dick. Ianto was right, though. It was a good thing Owen wasn’t still mutilating his undead body.

Walking down the steps, he patted Akiko on the shoulder. She looked up at him, and he motioned for her to leave. She straightened the sheet one last time before she went. Jack turned to Tosh next.

“Go,” he said, stepping between her and Owen.

Toshiko glared at him. “But-”

“I’ll handle it,” he told her.

She seemed as if she was going to argue, but he shook his head. She glanced around Jack at Owen, signed “ _no more dicks”_ (something Jack cannot believe he saw with his own two eyes), and stomped back up the stairs. Jack watched her go before turning to Owen.

Owen had his jaw set and his eyes narrowed, glowering defiantly at Jack. Jack exhaled deeply and rubbed his forehead. He needed a good few hours of sleep.

“ _What_?” Owen bit at him.

“ _Why are you doing this?”_ Jack asked tiredly.

_“Doing what?”_

There were times Jack just wanted to slap Owen. “ _Don’t be a child.”_

 _“Don’t make me feel like one,”_ Owen countered.

“ _I wouldn’t if you didn’t behave like one!”_

 _“Yes, you would.”_ Owen glared furiously. “ _You’re all different with me now.”_

“Owen,” Jack sighed aloud. This was going nowhere. “ _Listen. You’re different. We’re going to be different. That’s how this works.”_

_“Just fire me already. What are you waiting for?”_

“ _What?”_ Where the hell did this come from?

 _“Don’t pretend you don’t know.”_ Owen was absolutely enraged now. _“You brought Martha to replace me.”_

Jack blinked. _“Did you focus in the meeting at all?”_

There was a slight pause. _“…no.”_

Well. At least he was honest.

_“Martha is here for Tosh and her computers. They’re going to try to destroy the Sentries.”_

Owen mouthed an ‘oh.’

 _“No one is going to replace you,”_ Jack assured him. _“You’re a good doctor. Everyone loves you.”_

“ _Bullshit.”_

Jack laughed. _“You’re right. Everyone hates you. Now stop doing stupid things.”_

He would have hugged Owen then, because god knows they both needed it, but he didn’t. Instead, he ruffled Owen’s hair, winked, and bounced up the stairs.

Gwen’s turn.

Gwen was found helping Ianto in the kitchen. He would make the coffees, and she would bus them out to the tables. He kissed the back of Ianto’s head at the coffee maker briefly before walking over to Gwen and pulling her to a table.

“What, Jack?” Gwen asked, yawning.

“You should get more sleep.”

“I got more than you did.” She intertwined her fingers and put her hands on her belly.

“Touché.” He eyed her carefully. She looked weary to the bone. “Are you alright?”

“’Course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I don’t know,” Jack said. “We’re living in the Hub, you’re missing a finger, you lost your parents, you’re heavily pregnant… need me to go on?”

“No.” She played with her fingers. “I guess it’s just what Ianto said yesterday. About how shitty our life was.”

Jack looked over at Ianto, who was motioning a teen over to start carrying the coffees in Gwen’s stead. The first one came in his direction.

“Give my compliments to the chef,” Jack told the teen, loud enough for Ianto to hear across the room. Ianto snorted. Jack turned back to Gwen. “Gwen, he was just trying to make understand.”

“I’m not so sure about that,” she said morosely, “because when I think about it, my life really is crap. His life really is crap, too.”

He closed his eyes. “I know.”

“Do you?” Gwen asked. “Do you really? Because you’re the one keeping us locked up.”

Jack’s eyes snapped back open. Did they really think he was just doing this to spite them?

“Like I keep telling you,” Jack snarled, “I’m doing this for your own good. I’m not losing you, Gwen Cooper. I’m not losing Owen and I’m not losing Ianto. Why can’t any of you see that?”

His tone must have been angrier than he thought, because Gwen looked down at her hands and promptly shut up.

“Gwen,” he said, feeling even more tired than ever. “I just want you safe. I want your baby to be safe. I want Owen to be safe and to also act his age. I want Ianto to be safe and… just please stay safe.”

“Fine.” She gazed about her. “Can I go back to my miserable job now?”

“Don’t tell Ianto you think being his waitress is miserable,” Jack warned, employing a bit of cheer in his tone.

“Trust me, I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“Alright.” He pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her, which was slightly tricky due to her massive bulge. “Oh… he’s getting big.”

“She. Owen said she’s a she.”

“Got a name yet?” Jack asked. “Jacqueline is a good one. Just saying.”

“We’re not naming our baby after you, Jack Harkness.”

“It was worth a try,” he said, and he let her go. He rubbed her arm. “Don’t let your life slip, Gwen.”

Gwen gave him a sad smile as she left.

Ianto took her vacant seat. “That coffee doesn’t get better with age,” he said, propping his crutches against the table.

“Unlike me,” Jack said. He took a sip. “Oh, this is strong.”

“Only the best for you, sir.”

Jack beamed at him. “Anyone tell you that you’re wonderful?”

“Not recently.”

“Well, you- you are,” Jack yawned.

“When was the last time you slept?” Ianto asked.

Jack counted the hours in his head. “At least two days ago.”

“Maybe you should do that,” Ianto suggested.

“Pot and kettle, Ianto,” Jack said. “I know you didn’t sleep either.”

“ _I_ don’t have a strenuous job.” For once, Ianto seemed more concerned about Jack than bitter about his predicament.

“I’ll be fine,” Jack assured him. “But you-”

He interrupted Jack. “I don’t want to interrupt my sleep schedule.”

“Okay.” Jack finished off his coffee.

“Tosh said she doesn’t want to start searching for the ship until tomorrow,” Ianto said.

“Sounds good to me.”

“How are Owen and Gwen?”

“Owen’s… Owen, and Gwen’s just struggling with life.”

“Aren’t we all,” Ianto said dryly.

“How are you?” Jack asked. Now that Gwen had mentioned it, he was slightly concerned about Ianto’s comments at the meeting.

“Tired.”

“Other than that.”

“I think that’s just it, Jack. I’m just _tired_.” The expression on Ianto’s face corresponded with his words. It broke another piece of Jack’s mangled heart.

Jack leaned across the table and took Ianto’s hands. “If we’re lucky, this will all be over soon.”

“I hope so,” was Ianto’s response. He leaned forward a bit and brushed his thumb at Jack’s face. “Did you fall in mud earlier?”

“No.”

“You look like you did.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

Ianto’s face went through a range of emotions, and Jack grinned, observing what his dishevelled face did to the younger man.

“Maybe you should take a shower,” Ianto suggested with a coy smile.

“Maybe you should join me,” Jack replied coquettishly.

Ianto picked up his crutches and stood. “Only if don’t let me fall on my arse.”

Jack chuckled. “Of course not!”


	3. Chapter 3

Tosh found herself being jostled awake. Tish Jones was staring wildly at her.

“What’s that?” Tish asked her as a muffled cry echoed in the background.

“’s just Ianto,” Tosh said, rolling onto her side. “Go back to sleep.”

“Is he alright?”

“He’s fine,” Tosh mumbled.

To prove her point, the screams subsided. Jack had woken up and dealt with it, then.

“Is that normal?” Tish asked worriedly.

“Sometimes.”

“Who’s talking?” Akiko grumbled drowsily.

“Tish was woken up by Ianto,” Tosh informed her.

“Oh.” Akiko buried herself back under the blanket.

Tish seemed hesitant to do the same, but when the screams didn’t start up again, she eventually pulled up her blankets and went back to sleep.

There once was a time when Tosh would’ve been just as worried as Tish had been, but that was back when Ianto was still in pain. When Tosh was moved down to the bunker with Akiko and Jack and Ianto into Jack’s office, she was woken every night by Ianto. One night, the screams had been so loud and horrific that Tosh went up to see if he was alright. She was immediately greeted by Jack shaking his head at her and motioning for her to go back down. The next night she learned that closing the hatch to the bunker dimmed the noise quite a lot, and she started doing it every night.

Everyone dealt with nightmares differently. Occasionally Tosh would hear Gwen call out for Rhys, and every now and again Rhys would yell for Gwen. According to Ianto, Jack would wake from nightmares before the world had ended, but now he apparently just tensed up, paralyzed by the dream. Akiko would often whimper in her sleep, and Tosh herself woke many a night in cold sweat, terrified. She didn’t know what happened in the cells and the Archives, but she was sure it was much of the same.

Tosh had asked Akiko before they’d gone to bed if Tish had screamed in her sleep the night before. Akiko had said she didn’t know, because she’d been asleep. Tosh took that as a ‘no’ and hoped that theory stayed true. Thankfully, it did, but Tish’s light sleeping might prove to be a problem if she kept waking Tosh and Akiko up.

When she woke up again (naturally, this time), she tiptoed over the sleeping form of Tish and climbed up the ladder. She gently opened the hatch, making sure she didn’t wake anyone in Jack’s office. Nobody had stirred an inch when she left the room.

She made her way to the autopsy room.

“ _It’s early. You should be asleep,”_ Owen told her when he caught sight of her.

Tosh smiled ruefully. _“You know me. I don’t sleep much.”_

Owen nodded understandingly. He used to sit down in the bunker with Tosh and Akiko and read during the night. Akiko was weirded out by it until she got close to Owen, but Tosh thought it was sweet. Sometimes, when she’d wake up or couldn’t sleep, he’d read the reports he’d pulled from the Archives. It was a bit sad, because she missed hearing his voice, but it was also soothing in its own way. She knew that once she fell asleep, he’d go wandering the entirety of the Hub, looking for new ways to spend his sleepless nights. He probably knew more about the place than Jack (but not Ianto; nobody knew more than Ianto). But now that the Archives were filled, and the bunker was occupied by a new person, he wasn’t able to do those things anymore.

 _“How is your hand?”_ Tosh asked.

He held out his hand and Tosh inspected the stitches in the cut he’d never healed from. She wished they had more than the dissolvable stitches. She hated re-stitching his hand every two weeks.

“ _Not good_ ,” she informed him. “ _I’m going to fix them.”_

 _“Alright.”_ He gave her a sorry look.

And he should be sorry. All that self-mutilation just to prove a point? It sickened her. She redid his stitches in silence, hanging onto that disgusted fury while she did so.

“ _All done._ ” She studied her work. It looked far nicer than her last go. “ _I think I’m getting better.”_

She heard the door to Jack’s office close, and she hastily put away the suture materials. She expected it to be Jack or Ianto, the only two other early-risers, but she didn’t hear Jack’s heavily bouncing footsteps or Ianto’s crutches.

Martha’s head poked around the entrance to the autopsy bay. “Oh! I didn’t know anyone else was awake.”

“Good morning,” Tosh said, closing the drawer behind her.

Martha made her way down the stairs and sat on the bottom step. “Anything interesting happening down here?”

“Not really.” Tosh moved away from the drawer.

“Need me to clean anything? Or do something?” Martha asked, glancing around the room. Tosh thought she looked like she needed a distraction.

“I don’t think so,” Tosh said regretfully. Akiko and Owen kept the place pretty clean. When Owen wasn’t spraying graffiti everywhere, at least.

“Oh. Alright.”

“Couldn’t sleep, then?” Tosh asked, for lack of anything better to say, really.

“Haven’t had a good night’s sleep in over a year and a half,” Martha said with a crooked smile.

“I know what you mean. Ianto wake you up?”

She shrugged. “Wasn’t asleep then. Rhys snores.”

“If you’d like, you could move down with me,” Tosh offered. “There’s room. I’m sure Akiko wouldn’t mind. And your sister might like it better.”

“You sure?” Martha asked.

“Yeah. Owen doesn’t do much sleeping down there, so you won’t be haunted by the undead,” Tosh joked.

She looked over at Owen, who was squinting and shifting his eyes between Tosh and Martha. She recognized it as the face he made when he was wishing he could lip read.

“ _Sorry_ ,” she told him, feeling slightly rude.

“ _What’s happening?”_ he asked.

_“Martha couldn’t sleep.”_

Owen rolled his eyes.

_“She wants to know if you have work for her.”_

Owen thought for a second, then shook his head. _“No. But I can check her eye.”_

Tosh turned back to Martha. “Would it be alright if he could check out your eye?”

“Go for it,” Martha said, standing up.

Owen slid off the autopsy table as Martha hopped on. Martha removed the eyepatch, and it took a lot of strength from Tosh not to look away in horror. That didn’t look… pleasant.

“ _Ask her if it hurts_.”

“Does it hurt?”

“Not anymore.”

_“She says ‘no.’”_

Owen nodded. _“Okay. You can go.”_

_“What?”_

_“I know you don’t want to do this. Go.”_

Tosh frowned. _“What if you need to ask something?”_

 _“Pen and paper.”_ He pointed to the far side of the autopsy table.

 _“Did you steal that from me?”_ If she had to replace her notepad one more time…

_“No. It’s Jack’s.”_

“Okay, this is getting slightly heated,” Martha said cautiously, glancing between the two. “Should I be worried?”

“No. He’s just a thief, that’s all. Have fun!” Tosh turned to Owen. “ _Be nice. Don’t experiment.”_

And she left a baffled Martha there with a put-out Owen, figuring it was as good a time as any to start setting up the programme for later.

She was going to find that ship if it killed her. She was tired of the endless nightmare.

* * *

 

Gwen glared dangerously at Ianto. There was one chair left, and she was determined that he would get it. Also, he was carrying pens in his mouth again, which he foolishly refused to stop doing. Ianto glared back, no doubt equally as adamant that she would get the chair.

“Sit,” she instructed him.

He shook his head.

“Ianto,” she growled. “Sit.”

“He’s not a dog,” Rhys said from beside her. He glared at the pens in Ianto’s mouth. “You’ve gotta stop doing that, mate. You’re going to injure yourself.”

“Oh noooo,” Ianto said dryly from around the pens.

“Sit. Down.” Gwen pointed at the chair.

“You’re pregnant,” Ianto said. “ _You_ sit down.”

“That can’t be your argument every time,” Gwen said.

“Shut up, both of you,” Tosh snapped from her desk in front of them. “I need to concentrate.”

Tosh had successfully recreated the exact setup that the UNIT base had and was preparing to start the search for this Fenedi mothership. Gwen, Rhys, Martha, and Ianto had gathered around as Tosh made the last final adjustments according to the soldier Tommy’s recommendations.

“Why’s Tosh mad?” Jack asked as he joined the crowd. He frowned at Ianto. “Stop doing that.”

Ianto rolled his eyes as Jack took the pens from his mouth.

“They’re arguing over who gets the second chair,” Tosh said. “It’s distracting.”

“I can go get one from my office,” Jack offered.

“It’s _fine_ ,” Ianto stressed. “Gwen gets the chair. She’s got extra weight, I’ve got less.”

“That is such an unfair way to put it,” Gwen said, folding her arms.

“Shut up!” Tosh yelled. “Ianto, in the chair. Gwen, on the sofa.”

“Why do I go on the sofa?” Gwen asked.

“Because I said.”

“Well, that’s you told,” Rhys chuckled. He guided Gwen away.

“Ianto, she told you to sit,” Jack said as Rhys and Gwen settled in on the ratty old sofa.

“I can stand,” Ianto said defiantly.

“Ianto…”

“I can stand,” he repeated.

“Looks like we’re doing this the hard way,” Jack said, setting the pens down on Tosh’s desk.

Gwen wondered what the ‘hard way’ was. Apparently, it was Jack sitting down in the desk chair, scooting it close to Ianto, and then promptly yanking Ianto into his lap. Ianto gave an undignified yelp as he collapsed back, and Jack hugged his arms around Ianto’s waist as Ianto tried to escape. Ianto eventually gave up struggling. He crossed his arms and gave an enraged pout. Jack looked very smug.

“I think…” Tosh said quietly, “I think I’m ready.”

A silence fell over the area. Gwen found Rhys’s trembling hand and took it, terrified and hopeful all at once.

Jack straightened up in, his expression deadly serious. “Is everyone ready?”

“Everyone’s locked away in the lowest level of the Archives,” Ianto said solemnly. “Owen and Akiko are down there with Andy to make sure everything goes smoothly. And… just in case something happens.”

“You should be down there, too,” Jack told Ianto. He looked at Gwen. “Both of you.”

“We’ll be fine,” Gwen said. “They won’t get to us.”

Jack took a moment before he nodded. Gwen watched as his arms tightened their hold on Ianto, and he rest his chin on Ianto’s shoulder.

“How long did it take before they traced the signal?” Tosh asked Martha.

“Seconds,” Martha responded gravely. “Are you sure you can reach it from this far out?”

“With this tech? Please. I could reach it from the other side of the world,” Tosh said. Gwen appreciated her attempt at humour, but she didn’t think it would help anyone. She coughed lightly and sobered. “Shall I start?”

Jack nodded, and Tosh commenced her scanning.

Gwen realized how silly it was for her to be there. She’d really just stayed in spite of Jack, but now she was beginning to see how pointless it was. She was going to sit here, and the Sentries would bomb the Hub, and she, Rhys, and the baby would die. She should have gone below.

Rhys must have sensed her inner struggles, because he squeezed her hand and scooted closer to her. “It’ll be alright, love,” he whispered.

The following minutes were tense and quiet. One of Tosh’s pens could drop, and it would probably echo around the Hub for eternity.

“I’m in!” Tosh said suddenly, sounding more surprised than anything.

“What?” Martha asked. “ _In_? We never got that far!”

“Well, you aren’t Tosh,” Jack laughed. Gwen could tell it was a nervous laugh.

“I… there’s stuff here…” Tosh said, leaning close to her monitor. “I think… I think I can… just…”

“Tosh, whatever you think you can do, do it,” Jack commanded. “Do it now.”

“Yes, sir,” she said, and Gwen watched as she bent down, her fingers flying rapidly across her keyboard.

Martha watched over Tosh’s shoulder. “They’ve found us.”

Gwen felt her heart sink, and she held tighter to Rhys’s hand than she ever had before. She should have gone down to the Archives. Rhys pulled her close, but she couldn’t look at him. She couldn’t die unless she had one last good look at him, right? So, if she didn’t look… She watched Jack fervently press a kiss to the back of Ianto’s neck and turn his eyes to the ceiling.

The first bomb dropped, and Gwen felt the air shudder around her. A squeak escaped mouth before she could stop it.

“Tosh…” Jack said.

“Almost done,” Tosh said quickly.

The second and third and fourth explosions all happened at once, and Gwen’s eyes met Ianto’s. They were masked and didn’t betray anything, which was as good as them being filled with tears. He nodded at her solemnly.

She closed her eyes and prayed she didn’t die.

* * *

 

There was the slightest hint of a tremor. Owen looked up, hoping that everything was alright. He knew that the Hub was reasonably sound, but if all defenses failed, or if a Sentry somehow managed to get inside, it’d be over for everyone.

 _“Can you hear anything?”_ he asked Akiko.

Akiko cocked her head, listening. “ _Just a little.”_

_“No screams?”_

_“No. But I don’t think we could hear screams this far down.”_

That wasn’t a comforting thought. Tosh and the rest could all be dead, and they’d have no way of knowing. They could get stuck down here for eternity. Everyone around him would die, and he’d be sitting there forever. How long until he went insane?

Wait. Jack. Jack would come back and find him. Bloody Jack Harkness. Maybe Owen was better off down here losing his mind after all. He barely paid any attention as Akiko told him she was leaving to go help Andy; he was too busy thinking about eternity with a certain obnoxious captain.

Something tugged at his trousers. Owen looked down, disturbed from his mild panic attack. A boy no older than four (Daniel, if he remembered correctly), was staring up at him with wide eyes. He crouched down beside Daniel and smiled. The boy started crying, and it visibly started to disturb the other children around them, so Owen lifted a finger to his lips. Daniel stopped talking and gawked at him with tearful eyes.

Now, Owen might be a bitter old hag at times, but he wasn’t heartless. He held his arms out, and Daniel threw himself at Owen’s chest. Owen hugged him tightly and shut his eyes as he felt another tiny rumble. Daniel whimpered, and Owen opened his eyes, because he could _feel_ the vibrations against his shoulder. Odd. He’d never thought about that before. He should have, but he didn’t. What kind of doctor was he?

Daniel eventually pulled away, and another kid took his place. Sophie. She was five and had a younger brother, Evan, somewhere… there! He hugged them both and then patted them on the head. God, he could never let anyone know he was actually good with children or he’d end up doing this all of the time, like Ianto and Gwen. Then again, he wouldn’t really mind.

Then a boy he didn’t know came up to him. Owen assumed he was part of Martha’s lot, because he’d never seen the kid before in his life. He looked to be about six or seven years old, and he started talking to Owen. It started out slow, and then it turned into a quick babble. Owen stopped him with a hand on the boy’s shoulder, tapping his ear to say ‘ _deaf_.’ The boy didn’t seem to understand, and Owen watched as his face faltered. But before Owen could attempt anything else, Sophie stepped in front of the boy and started talking to him. When she was finished, the boy turned back to Owen with wide eyes, doubtlessly curious about the dead, deaf doctor.

“ _Thank you,”_ Owen signed to Sophie, and she beamed. Maybe he did want to get stuck playing nanny after all.

The kid turned and started talking quickly to Sophie instead of him, and that was when Owen realized he was stuck in a room filled with children and no other adults. He stood up and looked around the room for an older kid. The best he could find was a teen, but she wasn’t someone he knew. He spotted a younger teen in the far corner. Her name was Jess, and he remembered when he treated her for a concussion on her first day. He waved at her. She waved back, and he gestured for her to join him.

When Jess had pushed herself through the crowd, he showed her to the boy.

 _“Help him,”_ he directed her.

She nodded and turned to the boy, and Owen was ever so grateful to Gwen and Ianto for their rudimentary BSL lessons in that tiny school of theirs. Not that he’d ever tell them that.

 _“He wants his mother,”_ Jess reported to Owen.

The rest was said in Jess’s eyes; the boy was obviously an orphan. Owen crouched back down by the boy and shook his head sadly. The boy’s face contorted, but he didn’t cry.

Owen turned to Jess. “ _Distract everyone._ ”

She gave him a puzzled frown.

 _“D-I-S-T-R-A-C-T,”_ he repeated slowly, and recognition dawned in her eyes.

Five minutes later, Jess had the entire room of children singing. Owen was impressed, but glad he couldn’t hear them. Children might be sweet and all that, but that didn’t make them automatically in tune.

The rumbling had stopped a while ago, but the kids, too busy singing, hadn’t noticed, and Owen hadn’t seen anyone come in to tell them everything was alright. In order to keep his own panic at bay, he interacted with the kids. To the kids he knew, he asked them small questions. Favourite colours, favourite animals, how do you spell your name? and the works. To the kids he didn’t know, he introduced himself with the help of the ones he did know.

“ _I’m Owen. O-W-E-N_ ,” he told one girl.

Sophie, who stuck with him the entire time, translated for the girl. The girl said something to her, and Sophie, on her tiny fingers, spelled for him, “ _C-H-L-O-E.”_ Chloe and Sophie started talking excitedly, and Owen moved on to a little girl he knew, Molly. He’d once treated her for an ear infection.

“ _Hi_ ,” he signed to her. “ _What is your favourite food?”_

The little girl thought about it. “ _Banana_.”

He was curious to know if that was true or if that was just the only food she knew how to sign. God, he’d kill for a banana, though. He hadn’t had one in over two years. Diane loved bananas. Diane… he wondered what she’d think of him now. Undead and therefore unable to be her lover. Then again, if she were still around, it probably wouldn’t matter. Hardly any time for sex in the middle of an apocalypse. And it wasn’t exactly the sexiest thing to live in an underground base shared with what was now over one hundred and sixty people.

“ _I like cats_ ,” Molly told him.

He didn’t, but oh well. “ _Good!”_

The door opened, and Owen found himself looking up at Rhys. Molly ran over to him and hugged his legs. Rhys was a very popular man with the kids. Owen was only a bit jealous.

Rhys smiled down at Owen. “ _Didn’t think you liked kids,”_ he signed shakily.

Owen shrugged. “ _They’re alright_.”

“ _You should be a teacher. They’d like that.”_

 _“Some of them can’t sign.”_ He pointed out to some of the new kids.

_“You and Ianto can teach them.”_

Owen didn’t think that to be half-bad. But that was a discussion for another time. _“What happened?”_

Rhys shook his head. _“Tosh will explain later.”_

Which really meant ‘Rhys had no idea what happened.’ Owen tried not to smile at that thought. If he was honest with himself, Owen would admit he actually liked Rhys. He was a decent guy. Kind of made him feel shitty about sleeping with Gwen.

 _“Everyone okay?”_ Owen asked, remembering the quakes.

_“Yes.”_

Rhys started talking to the kids then. Owen didn’t even try to pay attention. He watched the kids get all excited and cheer, forgetting all of their worries instantaneously. Rhys started to lead them out of the room and Sophie, the sweet thing, took Owen’s hand. Owen would deny it if anyone asked him, but that made his day.

Andy and Akiko caught up with him.

“ _Sorry,_ ” Akiko apologized. _“I was busy.”_

Owen tugged his hand away from Sophie and shooed her off. He waved goodbye to her as she ran off to join the other kids. He was vaguely aware that Andy was laughing at him, and he threw the ex-PC a gesture that he didn’t have to know how to sign to understand. Andy shut up after that.

 _“It’s fine,_ ” he told Akiko. _“Everyone had fun.”_

But as fun as had been, it was time to start facing reality again. He hoped Tosh had figured a way out of this mess. He’d like to be able to go outside again.

* * *

 

Jack brushed some hair out of Ianto’s face.

“Well,” Jack said, giving him a smile, “that wasn’t so bad, was it?”

“You thought we were going to die, didn’t you?” Ianto asked.

“No…”

Jack looked about him. There was dust from the Hub’s high ceiling everywhere. He kicked at the sofa and the dust flew into the air.

“I bet you’re glad you don’t have to clean this mess,” Jack said, watching it settle.

“I don’t know,” Ianto said quietly. “I think I wouldn’t mind the cleaning if it meant having two legs again.”

“You miss running that badly?” Jack asked, purposely letting his joke fall flat.

Ianto gave him that sad look- the one that always killed Jack to see on Ianto’s face. It hurt worse than any gunshot to the head or knife to the chest. He closed the distance between him and Ianto, cupping Ianto’s face in his hands and pressing their foreheads together.

“If I could go back in time and change this…”

“You wouldn’t,” Ianto said softly. “I wouldn’t let you.”

“Why not?” Jack asked. “I could fix this. I could fix everything.”

“Sometimes, you can’t fix it, Jack,” Ianto said, his breath ghosting over Jack’s lips. “Sometimes, you just have to move forwards.”

Jack smiled. “Keep talking like that and I’ll call you ‘granny.’ You sound older than _me_.”

“Being old doesn’t make you smart, Jack. You should know that.” Ianto smirked.

“Are you calling me stupid?”

“Oi!” Gwen called. “Loverboys! Are you coming?”

“Yep!” Ianto called, pulling his face from Jack’s hands.

“Hurry up!”

“We’d better get going before Tosh calls a mutiny,” Jack said.

“I don’t think if Tosh would do that. Gwen, on the other hand…”

Jack snorted. “Come on.”

Ianto shook his head. “Go on ahead. There’s stairs involved; I don’t want to make you wait for me.”

“Ianto, I will always wait for you,” Jack said.

“That’s a long time to be waiting,” Ianto replied.

“So it is. Now, don’t make it any longer by just standing there,” Jack said, motioning him forward.

Ianto insisted three more times on the walk to the conference room that Jack should leave him. Jack refused each time. But, damn, he’d have given anything to hold Ianto’s hand as they walked. It wasn’t something he’d thought of much before the world had ended, but now? Hindsight is twenty-twenty, he supposed.

“Finally bothered to join us, then?” Andy asked as they entered the conference room.

“Andy, get out of here,” Jack snapped.

Andy jumped out of Ianto’s chair. “Fine! Someday you’ll regret it, though.”

“Not likely,” Jack called after Andy as he left. He turned to Tosh. “Now. Mind telling us what you found?”

“Well,” Tosh said, standing up while Jack sat down. “First thing I’ve found. It is Fenedi-”

“Bastards,” Rhys spat automatically.

Tosh silenced him with a glare. “Right. Anyway. It’s Fenedi. But no one’s running it.”

“What?” Jack asked, stunned.

“It’s a fully automated,” Martha said. “Nobody’s home.”

“But why?” Ianto asked. “Why would they just-”

“I stopped asking ‘why’ the minute they destroyed my city,” Gwen snapped. “There’s no ‘why’ in this. They’re just killing to kill.”

“We don’t know that for certain,” Ianto said coolly.

“Oh! Sorry, I guess I’m forgetting the part where they _killed most of humanity and then took the rest as slaves?”_

“That’s not helpful, Gwennie,” Rhys said, patting her hand. “Stop trying to bite Ianto’s head off.”

In any other situation, Jack would have been very tempted to make a lewd joke. But not now.

“Tosh?” he asked. “Martha?”

“Well,” Martha said. There was a strange mix of emotions on her face. “We can take it down.”

A hush fell over the room.

 _“You’re joking,”_ Owen signed when Akiko caught him up to speed.

Jack was of a similar mind. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely,” Tosh said straight-faced.  

“Before we get any of our hopes up,” Rhys said, “what exactly would that mean? Destroying it. What would it do?”

“That’s where… that’s where this actually starts looking up for us,” Martha said, still maintaining that odd expression. Jack thought she looked like she was close to tears. “There’s a web of these. Thirteen. All over major parts of the globe. They’re linked together in a large… network, I guess.”

Jack frowned but said nothing. He wanted to hear more about the network before he made any judgements. Just because it sounded similar to a very specific year of his life didn’t mean that there would be another time reversal.

“They seem to be in control of the Sentries in the area,” Tosh added. “From what we can tell, they’re the brains behind the Sentries. They read the human life signs, they send out a Sentry, and they issue the orders to shoot or blow up. So, if you take one down, then you take down the Sentries.”

“The best part,” Martha said, “is that if you knock one out, you knock them all out.”

Jack slumped back in his chair and stared at the table, trying, and failing, to process what that could possibly denote.

“You mean this could be over,” Gwen said quietly. “We could be free. No more threat of attack, no more threats of death, no more-” She cut herself off, shaking her head and visibly holding back tears.

“Free to walk outside,” Ianto whispered. Jack glanced over sharply to him, but his eyes were far away, already dreaming of the future.

“ _Fuck_ ,” was all Owen would add. He seemed dazed.

“What’ll it cost?” Jack asked weakly when he found his voice.

“Why does it have to cost something?” Rhys asked. “Tosh said they find life signs. What if we confuse them to think there’s no more life signs? Hide all of us.”

“There’s no way to mask all the life signs of all the people on Earth,” Martha said.

“What if we used some sort of cloaking technology?” Ianto asked. “Like with the invisible lift?”

“This isn’t Star Trek,” Martha apprised him. “It doesn’t work that way.”

“It’s never Star Trek,” Ianto muttered softly to himself. Jack almost laughed; he found Ianto’s hand under the table and took it in his own.

“So, we find a way to destroy it, then,” Gwen said. “Once and for good. Wipe it out of existence.”

“There’s got to be something in the Archives for that,” Rhys said. “Some sort of giant weapon that can take down spaceships.”

“If we had something that powerful, don’t you think we would’ve used it on the Sentries?” Ianto asked. “There’s nothing like that down there.”

“Well, there should be. What kind of alien specialists don’t have things that could blow up spaceships? Or other aliens?”

“I’ll remember that next time we see an alien,” Ianto said dryly. “‘Oh, hello, we really need to borrow a giant gun for our hoard. Do you have one? We may or may not use it on you.’”

Rhys held up his trembling hands defensively. “I’m just saying…”

“Now _you’re_ being unhelpful,” Gwen told him.

“What about blowing it up from the inside out?” Jack asked.

Everyone turned to him.

“No,” Ianto said ardently.

“I just want to know if it would work,” Jack said.

“What, so we can let you blow up too?”

“I’d come back,” Jack reminded him.

“Then get stuck up there, floating around forever,” Ianto said, letting go of his hand under the table. “You’re not doing it.”

“And if it’s the only way to save the human race?”

“We’ll find another way,” Ianto said.

Jack sighed. “Ianto, you can’t just refuse every plan that ends in my death.”

“Why not?” he asked stubbornly.

“Because that would be most plans that can save us.”

“You’re not risking your life to save us, Jack. You’ve done that enough already.”

“And who’s going to do it instead?” Jack asked. “I can die. I can come back. Nobody else can. I can spare a little pain now and again if it means everyone else stays safe.”

“Guys!” Tosh interjected.

“What?” they asked, glaring at her.

“This is not the time to be having this conversation. Argue about chivalry later,” Tosh said. “We’ve got the future of the Earth in our hands. Besides, this is all theoretical at the moment.”

“Brainstorming,” Martha went on.

“Exactly,” Jack told Ianto. He turned back to Tosh. “So, _theoretically_ , would it work? Me blowing the ship up?”

Tosh shifted uncomfortably. “I mean, yes-”

Jack nodded. “Then we do it.”

“No,” Ianto reiterated, slamming his hand down on the table.

“Ianto-”

“How do we even know it would work?” Ianto asked.

“Tosh just said-”

“Sure, yes, it would work. Temporarily. Who says the Fenedi won’t come back?” Ianto asked. “Who says they won’t learn their ship is destroyed and return? What makes you think they’ll let us get away that time? They’re not going to let us live. If they come back, we’re doomed. We’re _dead_.”

Another silence followed, but it was more uncomfortable than awed.

“He’s got a point,” Martha said faintly.

“I generally do,” Ianto retorted.

Jack sadly noted at Ianto’s seething rage. He sought out Ianto’s hand again. Ianto tried to pull it away, but Jack held tight. Ianto narrowed his eyes threateningly, and Jack let go and sat back in his chair.

“If we can’t destroy it,” Gwen said, the hope leaving her voice, “what are we supposed to do?”

 _“Live our miserable lives,”_ Owen signed, “ _until we die from starvation or bombs or something awful_.”

“Sorry, what did he say?” Martha asked.

“It wasn’t a real suggestion,” Gwen said. “Just Owen being Owen.”

“ _Don’t dismiss me!_ ” Owen signed furiously.

“ _That was rude,”_ Akiko added, shaking her head at Gwen.

Gwen gave them apologetic glance. “ _Sorry_! _But your anger wasn’t helping.”_

 _“Fuck you,”_ Owen signed, glaring.

 _“Also rude,”_ Akiko reiterated, this time to Owen.

“When this is over, someone’s got to teach me how to sign,” Martha sighed.

That would probably be for the best. That way, Owen wasn’t left out and Akiko didn’t have to play nanny. She was a good kid, but Jack knew she would much rather be studying medicine than translating and dealing with Owen’s ridiculous shenanigans. Owen seemed to have left an impression on her; she was acting more like a mother than the teenager she was.

“This won’t ever be over. That was Owen’s original point,” Ianto said.

“No,” Martha said. “I refuse to believe that. We found a weakness, we can exploit it. We’ve got to!”

“There’s nothing we can do, Martha,” Ianto said. He gave a low chuckle. “I hope you like canned soup. We’re going to be eating that until we die.”

“I somehow feel worse than I did before,” Akiko murmured. She signed that to Owen, and he patted her arm gently.

“ _Hope is evil,”_ Owen signed frankly.

“ _No, it isn’t,”_ Gwen responded.

“ _So, you don’t feel bad right now?”_ he asked caustically.

Gwen didn’t answer.

“Hang on,” Tosh said abruptly. Jack realized she hadn’t said anything in a while. She looked deep in thought.

“What is it, Toshiko?” he asked.

“Rhys had a point.”

“I did?” Rhys appeared astonished. “Really?”

“What if,” Tosh said slowly, “what if we confused them to think we weren’t here? No one would come looking for us if they thought we were all gone.”

“But we just said cloaking doesn’t do that,” Ianto said. “Not Star Trek, remember? We’re not Romulans. Or Klingons. Or the Defia-”

“Okay, we get it, you’re a nerd,” Gwen broke through Ianto’s rambling. “Can we please get back on track?”

“We trick the system,” Tosh said. “That’s all.”

“They still might come back,” Ianto said.

Jack thought about that. “I don’t think so. If it had been their intentions to colonize the world, they would’ve stayed. They just took people prisoner. I think they got what they wanted.”

“How can you be sure?” Rhys asked.

He shrugged. “I can’t be. But it’s our best bet.”

“I suppose we could also trick it to believe the Earth is slowly dying,” Tosh suggested. “Just in case. Nobody wants to colonize a dying planet, I’d imagine.”

“Toshiko, you’re brilliant,” Jack said, grinning at her.

“Oh. Thanks!”

“Is there a word for ‘colonize?’” Akiko hissed to Rhys.

“No clue.”

“There probably should be, considering… all of history,” Akiko mused, before choosing to fingerspell the word to Owen instead.

 “Again, staying on the subject?” Gwen said.

“It’s a good plan,” Martha said.

“It’s a great plan,” Jack corrected. “Nobody dies.”

He gave Ianto a pointed gaze. Ianto’s face was inscrutable.

“Assuming the Hub can take that kind of heat again,” Rhys commented. “If we do it through our computers again.”

“I think you mean if _I_ do it through _my_ computers again,” Tosh said, “…but we can’t.”

“What?” Jack asked quickly.

“You might’ve mentioned that a bit sooner,” Ianto said. “Before everyone got their hopes up again.”

“We can still do it,” Tosh said. “We’d just have to be on the ship. Station. Thing.”

“Anyone got a spaceship I could borrow?” Jack asked jokingly.

“Huh,” Ianto said.

“What?”

“Nothing. It’s just that minutes ago you were prepared to sacrifice your life on that bloody thing, and you didn’t even have a way to get there.”

Jack sighed. This was going to be a very long argument.

“Project Indigo,” Martha said suddenly.

Jack’s eyes went wide. “No!”

“Why not?” Martha asked.

“It was still in the experimental stage,” Jack said. “It’s not safe. You’d just be risking your life unnecessarily.”

Ianto snorted.

A very, _very_ long argument, then.

They didn’t used to get into those. Jack wondered what that said about them.

“Wait a minute.” He held up his wrist. “I’ve got a transporting device myself!”

“You’re just now remembering that?” Ianto asked as Gwen said, “But that’s broken!”

“It’s not broken. Just scrambled.” He looked at Martha. “I need to know the teleport base code on the Indigo device.”

“The what now?” Martha asked.

“The teleport- oh, never mind. Toshiko?”

“Yes, Jack?”

“Can you break into UNIT’s old classified projects?”

“Do you really have to ask that?”

Of course, she could. She was his beautiful Toshiko, hellbent on making UNIT’s existence as miserable as hers had been in that prison.

“I need you to do that for me.”

Tosh got out her laptop and turned it on. She tapped something quickly, and then something again.

“Okay. Done.”

“Wow.” He hadn’t expected it to be _that_ fast. “Alright. You’re going to look up Project Indigo. Then you’re going to find something about a central panel.”

“…yeah, I found it.”

“There’s a long chain of numbers.”

“They keep changing,” Tosh noted. “Is that good?”

“That’s perfect,” he told her. “It’s absolutely wonderful. They’re doing what they’re supposed to be doing. Now, the fourth number. Which numbers is it oscillating between?”

“Four and nine.”

“Oh, Toshiko,” Jack chuckled, plugging those into his vortex manipulator, “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she said, slightly bemused. “But what did I just do?”

“This baby works again,” he said, tapping the wrist strap. “Well, sort of. It teleports. Not sure about the time aspect, but that’s not important.”

“You’ve had a teleporter all this time, and you didn’t tell us?” Ianto asked.

“It… wasn’t important back then,” Jack said.

They weren’t in the habit of keeping secrets from each other. Not anymore. There wasn’t much of a reason to. But he’d had so many that he just sort of forgot about some of them.

“We could do this,” Martha said, stunned. “We could actually _do_ this.”

“Christ,” Rhys said.

Tosh nodded. “We’ve got the chance to- ouch!”

Akiko grumbled, vexed, and everyone turned their heads to look at Owen. He had a pile of elastic bands lying on the table. Jack honestly wasn’t that surprised, but Toshiko starred daggers at him.

“ _Sorry,”_ Owen signed. “ _Wrong person_.”

Jack, noting that Ianto was eyeing the pile of bands curiously, snatched them away from Owen and shoved the bands in his pocket.

“We can discuss the rest of this tomorrow,” Jack said. “It’s late, and we need to eat.”

“ _Not me_ ,” Owen signed.

He snapped a forgotten band at Jack and it hit him in the forehead. Tosh was right. Ouch.

“ _You’re a child_ ,” Jack told him.

Owen called him something that caused Akiko to sigh in frustration.


	4. Chapter 4

Gwen fiddled with the pen in front of her. First, she lined it up parallel to the edge of the table. Then she flipped it around so that it was exactly perpendicular. She adjusted it until it was just right, and then felt very silly. She was starting to act like Ianto. She even felt like making coffee for no apparent reason.

Speaking of Ianto and coffee, where were they? Jack had woken everyone up extra early for this, and she was dead tired. She couldn’t actually drink the coffee (stupid Owen and his ‘pregnancy rules’), but she could at least smell Rhys’s coffee to wake her up a bit. Okay, sometimes she took a few sips, too, but that was hardly going to kill her, was it? Her stomach was feeling a bit upset, though, so she probably wouldn’t steal any that morning.

Ianto came in with Akiko following him, carrying a large tray of coffees in her hands, thank god. She started handing them out, but Jack went and claimed his personally. Gwen watched as he gave Ianto a light kiss before taking a drink of his coffee.

They’d quietly fought for a good portion of the night, when they thought everyone was asleep. Nobody was, and Gwen and Martha had exchanged glances every time they brought up a rather sensitive subject. Rhys kissed her forehead every time they talked about his leg; he knew that she often had nightmares about that awful day. Ianto had once rather unfairly started talking about what ‘life would have been like’ during the night. He’d said something about them having an unsafe job, and how he probably would have died from some alien flu or something sooner or later. Jack’s tone got very low and very serious after that, and Gwen had expected a full confession of love, but oh no! Those two stubborn pricks still refused to admit anything. Even when they made up. Which they luckily left the room for.

“Good coffee,” Jack said with a wink and Gwen’s eyes went wide.

“No innuendos before seven, please,” Martha said, drinking her own coffee.

“That wasn’t an innuendo!” Jack protested.

Martha eyed him skeptically. “Uh huh.”

“Guys,” Tosh said wearily. “I just want to get this over with.”

“Right,” Jack said, completely serious.

Excitement welled in Gwen’s chest. Rhys had told her already that she shouldn’t get her hopes up, there’s still the possibility this could fail. But she couldn’t help it. The chance to go outside without worrying about Sentries, and the idea she could raise her baby in a safe world… it was just too exhilarating.

“So, how do we do this?” she asked, failing to keep the thrill from her voice.

Tosh gave her a sidelong glance. “With a lot of difficulty.”

That killed Gwen’s mood easily.

Akiko sighed. “Why can’t things be easy for a change?”

“Because aliens are arseholes,” Rhys said.

Ianto made a noise in assent.

“What do we need to do, Toshiko?” Jack asked, finally moving to sit in his chair.

“Well…” Tosh said, flicking through pages on her newest notepad. “I’ve combed through everything again, and remote access still isn’t an option. Not entirely, that is.”

“What do you mean, not entirely?” Martha asked.

“I can watch what’s going on from down here,” she explained, “but I can’t do anything.”

“So, what you’re saying is, whoever goes up there won’t be flying blind?”

“Pretty much, yeah.”

“That’s comforting,” Jack said, nodding.

“Essentially,” Tosh went on, “what’s going to happen is someone’s going to go up and play a fun little computer game called ‘kill everyone on Earth, but not really.’”

“Owen should go,” Gwen said, smiling.

It had been intended as a joke, because Owen had spent quite a lot of his time in Torchwood playing video games, but Owen didn’t seem to be pleased by it. He gave her one of the most expressionless looks she’d ever seen on him, and it broke her heart just a little.

“We need someone who can hear me over the comms,” said Tosh quietly.

Gwen felt ashamed and said nothing more.

“I’m going,” Jack said, cutting through the tense silence.

“Me, too,” Martha added.

Jack shook his head. “I should go alone. It could be dangerous.”

Gwen peered over at Ianto to see what he thought of that. Ianto gave no indication of being upset, which meant he was definitely upset.

“Actually,” Tosh said, “it would be helpful to have more than one person up there. From what I can see, there’s three consoles that you’ll need to use. It’d be faster to get done with more help.”

“And I’m brilliant,” Martha said. “You’re going to want me.”

“Fine,” Jack resigned.

“I could come,” Akiko said.

“No!” Jack and Tosh shouted together. Rhys jumped slightly in his seat at the intensity of it.

“Why not?” Akiko asked, downcast and indignant. “I can help!”

“You’re too young,” Tosh said.

“I’m smart,” Akiko said. “If Martha can-”

“Martha’s been doing this kind of stuff for a while,” Jack said. “She can take care of herself.”

“ _I need you here,”_ Owen told her when Ianto had alerted him to the dispute.

Akiko didn’t ask again after that, but she looked damned unhappy.

“Then that means I’m going,” Rhys said.

Gwen snapped over to look at him. “No. Not a chance.”

“They need people,” Rhys said.

“No,” she repeated, shaking her head vigorously. “I won’t let you go, Rhys Williams.”

“Gwen-”

“No!”

“He’s a big boy, Gwen,” Jack said. “He can make his own decisions.”

“Jack, you can’t let him go,” she pleaded, fighting back tears. She couldn’t lose him, she couldn’t.

“We need him,” Jack said. “I’m sorry, but emotions have to be put aside right now. Fate of the world, remember?”

“Would you have let Ianto go?” she asked furiously, desperately. “If he could still go, would you let him?”

Jack didn’t respond, but his jaw set in a furious, incensed way.

“It was my job,” Ianto said coldly. “Of course, I would’ve gone.”

Gwen felt the heat die down in her chest a bit. “Sorry, Ianto, I didn’t mean-”

“I know,” he said. “But you’ve got to let Rhys do this.”

She swallowed, and tears threatened to fall again.

“Gwennie,” Rhys said gently, and she scrubbed at her face as the tears broke through. “I’ll be alright.”

“You’d better be,” she sniffed as soon as she regained control over herself, and Rhys clasped her hands in his.

“Take one more person,” Tosh recommended. “Just... just in case.”

Gwen observed Jack scanning the room around him. His face made the most minute expressions as he surveyed each available person. Pity for Owen, sorry for Akiko, understanding for Tosh. Pain for Ianto.

He took a quick, deep breath in, hiding all the emotions away in the way Jack always did. “Who can we rely on most that’s not here?”

“Andy,” Akiko said after consideration.

“No,” Gwen said hopelessly. They can’t send her best friend in as well as her husband.

“Gwen…” Jack sighed.

“Ask him, at least. Please,” Gwen begged. “Don’t just force him to do this.”

“Fine.”

 Gwen fell back into her chair and closed her eyes for a second. If she lost either of them…

“When you get in there,” Tosh said, “your job is going to be to confuse the computer.”

“I know, I know, make sure it can’t read life signs,” Jack said. “Switch it off, or whatever.”

“Not switching it off, necessarily,” Tosh amended. “If you did that, there’s still the possibility of alerting the Fenedi. It’d seem like tampering. You’re going to upload a programme that slowly starts to confuse the system into believing all life forms are dying.”

“How slowly?” Jack asked.

“It’ll take a few days,” Tosh said. “The programme, not you. You get in there, plug it in, and get out.”

“So, that’s still a few more days that people will be dying.”

“Not Cardiff. We need to eliminate all Cardiff life signs immediately,” Tosh explained. “They might break through the Hub this time, and we can’t have that.”

“We’re going to save our own asses and let everyone else deal with it for longer?” Rhys asked. “That’s a bit cruel.”

“It’s a risk we have to take,” she said solemnly. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” said Jack hastily. “This is our best bet. You did good, Tosh.”

“Thanks. But our work hasn’t even started.”

A quietness followed, and Gwen tried not to think about anything, because as soon as she did, she’d probably start crying. And then she wouldn’t be able to stop.

Jack cleared his throat. “We go later today,” he said. “After lunch.”

“Sounds fair,” Tosh said with a weak smile. “Don’t want to keel over from hunger in the middle of a Fenedi station.”

Gwen didn’t think food sounded very appetizing, really. Her stomach was feeling…

Oh.

Oh, god.

That’s not good.

She bit her lip and tried to keep her face calm. This wasn’t what she thought it was. It couldn’t be. This had to just be some more of those… what did Owen and Akiko call them? Braxton Hicks things? Yeah. That was it.

“Gwen, we’ll be fine,” Rhys said, misreading her face.

She nodded, and then shook her head.

Because she was panicking, she told no one. Owen said it could take a while for it to happen, right? Eighteen hours or something? And that was if this was even real. No need to worry anyone yet. She’d just have to wait it out until after they saved the world.

* * *

 

Owen watched as everyone said goodbye.

Gwen was with Rhys, kissing practically every inch of him that she could reach. She looked miserable. She was a sobbing wreck, even for Gwen. She’d looked that way for hours now, and Owen decided he should probably check her out later, just to see if she was alright. But not yet, because she was clinging onto Rhys like it was their last moments alive, and for Rhys, it very well might be. He’ll let the two have their moment before he goes all doctor-y on her.

 Andy and his boyfriend (David? Yeah, David.) were standing close together, joking around. Owen witnessed the ex-PC laugh at something David said, and David bounced on the balls of his feet. Clearly, neither of them had any idea what they were getting into. It was odd for Owen to see people that happy after all this time. Deep down inside, he hoped they’d still have that chance to be that happy later, too.

Jack and Ianto, on the other hand, were deadly serious. They were talking in what Owen assumed were those low tones they always used to have for each other. He wondered if they’d fessed up yet. Based on the way they were acting, he’d say not. Kind of sad, really. They deserved to hear that they were loved. Owen would tell them himself if he didn’t have a reputation to maintain.

Martha was hugging her sister, giving her encouraging smiles that didn’t meet her eyes. Owen respected the hell out of that woman. In another life, they could’ve been something great. Just not this life.

She caught him staring, and she grinned and waved. He returned it with an almost-smile and a wave of his own, and she let go of her sister to make her way over to him. He smacked Akiko’s arm.

“ _What?_ ” she asked.

Oh, the things he put her through. He felt a bit bad about that. Not enough to tell her, though. “ _Translate_.”

“ _Say please.”_ Good thing she could hold her own.

_“Please.”_

The first thing Martha did was hug him. It was a good hug, and it was during that hug when he started worrying. Jack would make it back, he always did, but… No. This was Martha Jones. He’d see her again.

She started talking next and Owen watched her lips until Akiko paraphrased for her.

_“’I’ll learn how to sign after. I promise. But I’ll be shit at it.’”_

_“Tell her that she’ll be fine. She’s brilliant.”_

Martha’s face broke into a smile, and she hugged him once more before returning to her sister.

When Owen caught Rhys’s eye, he gave him a quick nod and signed: “ _Good luck_.”

Rhys thanked him, and Gwen dragged his attention back to her.

Jack said his goodbye to Owen next. It wasn’t so much of a goodbye as a ‘take care of yourself, don’t do something stupid, don’t let Ianto do something stupid.’ Owen appreciated it nonetheless. Jack gave him a salute and a wink and that was it.

Minutes before Jack, Martha, Rhys, and Andy left, everyone save Tosh started funneling down to the lowest level of the Archives. Seemed like everything happened down there these days. Owen started to follow Akiko and Ianto, then stopped.

He had a better idea.

* * *

 

“Ready to go?” Jack asked Tosh.

She frowned at the monitors in front of her. “Everything’s all set.”

“Everyone else?” he asked, employing cheer that he most certainly did not feel.

“I suppose,” Rhys said.

“Got your guns?”

“I don’t see why we need them,” Andy complained. “They never worked against the Sentries, why would they work against a Sentry ship?”

“Would you rather go in with no protection whatsoever?” Jack asked.

“Well, no, but-”

“Then that settles it,” Jack said. “We use guns.”

Nobody said anything in response, and Jack took that as a sign that they needed to get going before one of them got cold feet.

“Right,” he said brusquely. “Let’s go. Hands on the wrist strap, please.”

They did as they were bid with only minor grumbling from Andy. Jack pressed a few buttons, and… 

* * *

 

Most of the people were not allowed to use the lifts; they had to use the stairs. Ianto and Gwen were some of those fortunately unfortunate few that were allowed. It meant Gwen didn’t have to trundle her way down the stairs, thank god. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to make it.

Another wave came over her, and she sucked in her lips and tried to keep from shouting out. That made five minutes. One every five minutes for over two hours.

This was real, wasn’t it?

* * *

 

… it was green inside. Green and red and dark. It made even the Hub look bright. There was metallic mesh below them and walls with thick, snaking, coiling wires and cables. The ceilings were pitch dark and stung with pipes. Everything felt eerie and wrong.

“Okay,” Martha said, keeping his voice down. “We made it.”

“Apparently so,” Jack said. He pressed his comms. “Tosh?”

“ _Amazing that we can still get reception from this length_ ,” Tosh’s voice crackled on through.

“Amazing that you could get that working,” Jack retaliated kindly. “But now’s not the time for amazing. Are you in the system yet?”

“ _No_ ,” she said. “ _It’ll take a few minutes, just like the last time._ ”

“Still have the blueprints from last time?”

“ _Yeah, hang on, I’ll send them through to your wrist strap.”_

* * *

Tosh opened another programme and began typing instructions. She wasn’t going to lie, she was nervous. Then again, when wasn’t she nervous?

A movement from the corner of her eye startled her. She stopped typing and turned to see someone walking up to her.

“Oh no,” she groaned.

 _“Tosh?”_ Jack’s voice asked.

Owen waved at Tosh. “ _Hello!”_

 _“What are you doing here?”_ she asked frantically. He should be downstairs.

“ _Didn’t want you to be alone,”_ Owen signed.

_“It’s too dangerous! Go downstairs!”_

_“Tosh?”_ Jack asked over the comms. “ _Is everything alright?”_

“Um…” She probably shouldn’t tell Jack about this. “Yeah, sorry. It’s just taking a little longer. Hold on for a few more seconds.”

She didn’t turn back to Owen before she started typing commands into her keyboard, and Owen seemed to take that as a sign that he could stay.

“Did you get them?” Tosh asked, trying not to panic, trying not to think.

“ _Yeah_ ,” Jack said. “ _Are you going to link yourself in now?”_

Tosh looked at Owen. He gave her an encouraging not-smile, and she bit her lip. She knew she was probably going to die, but him? He shouldn’t be here. She couldn’t let him die again.

“ _Please go_ ,” she begged. “ _Please_.”

“ _No_ ,” he refused. “ _I’m not leaving you alone.”_

“ _Tosh_?” Jack asked. “ _Your silences are kind of worrying_.”

“Hold on,” she said, and her voice only broke a little.

“ _Please_ ,” she pleaded Owen again.

He shook his head, and with an ache in her soul, Tosh knew she couldn’t persuade him to save himself. She turned away, so he didn’t see her start to cry.

“I’m starting now,” she told Jack.

“ _Good luck,”_ Jack wished.

She herself prayed for some, too.

* * *

 

Since Andy was gone, Ianto and Gwen were stuck with the kids. Ianto was unofficially left in charge by Jack, but Gwen was looking really stressed, and he didn’t want to leave her alone with fifty-some children. The adults could take care of themselves, he was sure.

They were stuck in the biggest room of the lowest level Archives. Ianto wished there was a chair for Gwen to sit in, because she was steadily looking worse and worse. There were blankets and some pillows from the newcomers that slept in the room, but nothing to sit on.

It had only been a few minutes when Gwen gasped. Her face was contorted, and she looked like she was about to cry.

“Okay,” Ianto said. “What’s wrong?”

Gwen didn’t respond. She screwed her eyes tightly shut and held onto her stomach. She let out another gasp in pain, and then a sob.

Oh, shit.

“Oh, shit,” he said out loud, because merely thinking it was not good enough.

“Miss Gwen! Mr. Ianto said a bad wooord,” a little boy named Kieran tattled.

“Now?” Ianto asked Gwen, ignoring the boy.

Gwen nodded and took a deep breath. And then another. And another. And then she said: “Now.”

Ianto stared at her for a second, stunned. “Well, why the hell didn’t you say anything before?” he cried.

“Miss Gwen, he said another bad word!”

“Not now, Kieran,” Ianto snapped.

“I didn’t think that it was real before!” Gwen said.

“Did your water break?”

“… now that you mention it, yeah.”

“Oh,” he exhaled deeply, “for the love of god. You’re giving birth. Right now.”

“Don’t have a panic attack on me!” Gwen squeaked. “If anyone should be panicking, it’s me!”

“But you didn’t panic, and that’s the problem!”

“I had a few other things on my mind, thanks!”

“What’s more important than giving birth, Gwen?”

“I DON’T KNOW!” Gwen shouted.

They glared at each other for a moment before reality started to sink in.

“You’re giving birth,” Ianto said slowly.

“I know,” Gwen replied, her eyes wide. “What am I going to do?”

“This happened on Star Trek once,” he said.

“Not helpful.”

“I don’t think I can be very helpful,” he apprised her. “I don’t know much about childbirth.”

“Neither do I, to be honest,” Gwen said. “Didn’t pay attention to anything Owen told me.”

“Huh.”

They stood for a moment more before the trembling began. Ianto looked up and tried not to panic even more. Gwen, on the other hand, doubled over as far as her belly would let her and moaned. Well, more of a shriek and a moan, really.

“Okay,” Ianto said. He looked around to the children, all of whom were staring at him and Gwen. “Who’s the oldest here?”

“That’d be me!” a voice said.

A teenaged girl pushed to the front.

“Great,” Ianto said. “And you are?”

“Lucy.”

“Perfect,” Ianto said. “You’re going to watch the kids, alright? I’m going to be a bit busy.”

“Okay,” Lucy said slowly.

“Jess,” Ianto said. “Where’s Jess?”

“Here!” Jess raised her hand from the back of the room.

“Go find Doctor Owen,” he told her. “Quickly!”

She sprinted off, and Gwen stood up.

“That makes just under three minutes,” Gwen whispered.

“Is… that bad?”

“I think that means I’m going to actually give birth soon.”

“…shit.”

“Miss Gwen-”

“Not now, Kieran!”

“Someone please place a stack of blankets out!” Ianto said. “We’re going to get Miss Gwen laying down because I don’t know what else to do.”

A few girls scuttled about gathering blankets and pillows, and he directed them to spread them out by a wall. Gwen only got down on the floor because Ianto yelled at her to. Jess came running back to tell him that Owen was nowhere to be found, and Akiko was busy with someone else.

Ianto stood there by Gwen for a moment as another tremor shook the room. “Okay. Alright. I need someone tall… you, there! What’s your name?”

“Jack.”

“Haha, that’s great. That’s really great. Wonderful. Okay, Jack,” he said to the boy, “you’re going to help me down to the floor. And then I’m going to pretend like I know how to deliver a baby.”

* * *

 

“To the left,” Jack notified them as they came to a fork in the corridor.

“We’ve been walking for ages,” Andy said. “Shouldn’t we have reached… whatever it is we’re supposed to reach by now?”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Andy, but this is a pretty big ship,” Jack said. “How’s it going, Toshiko?”

“ _Fine, fine. Just… trying to figure out what these dots mean_.”

Jack had noticed from the beginning that she seemed a bit distracted. He’d told her that she’d make it, and even though she probably hadn’t believed him, she wasn’t one to panic under stress like that.

“Dots?” he asked.

“ _Yeah,”_ Tosh said. “ _Well, more like little lines or something. I don’t know_.”

“Stupid bloody ship,” Andy muttered to himself, kicking at some low hanging cabling.

“Andy,” Jack warned. He turned his focus back to Tosh. “Can you find out what they-”

There was a blood-curdling scream that came from behind him, and he whipped out his gun. Jack turned to find Andy, suspended in midair. He was pierced through the abdomen by some of the bulky cabling, his mouth and eyes wide open in terror. And he was also dead.

“Holy shit,” Rhys hissed as Jack felt something inside him rot away and die.

Andy’s body dropped to the floor and the cables snaked away.

“Oh, my god,” Martha said.

“Tosh,” Jack said slowly. “I think I found your little lines.”

“… _are you alright?”_

“Andy’s dead.” His voice felt as empty as his chest.

_“…oh…”_

Jack noted the sounds of explosions in the background. “Are you alright?”

“ _Never better_.”

It was a lie and he knew it, but he had no choice but to pretend he didn’t. “Okay. We’re not far from the control room.”

“ _Be careful_.”

“You too, Toshiko.” He turned to the rest. “We… we have to leave him.”

Martha nodded, face stony, and Rhys said nothing as he stared down at Andy’s lifeless, bloody body.

“I’m sorry,” he told them. “But we’ve got to go.”

“Fate of the world,” Martha whispered.

“Fate of the world.”

* * *

 

While Owen couldn’t hear the erupting bombs, he could certainly feel them. And there was dust shaking from the ceiling.

He was pretty sure the Hub wouldn’t last that much longer.

Tosh didn’t look alright. She had been talking to Jack when something came across her face, and he was pretty sure she was crying. Something must have happened up there, and he wasn’t sure he could bear to know just yet.

There was another large rumble and even more of the ceiling rained down on him. Tosh looked away briefly from her screens to cast a worried glance upwards. She was hiding it very well, but Owen hadn’t seen her so scared in his life. An additional big quake made up his mind.

He didn’t know how to alert her, because she was busy typing furiously away. He couldn’t risk forcing her to take her hands and eyes away from her computer, not even for a moment. Drumming his fingers on his knee, he searched about for another means for communication.

Bingo. Pen and paper.

When he snatched them from her desk, he saw her eyes flicker to him briefly. He could only imagine what she was thinking of him at the moment. Probably disappointed he was taking the time in the middle of a rather destructive Sentry attack to draw porn on her papers. It wasn’t as if he hadn’t earned that.

Quickly scribbling down his message, he felt yet another tremble and witnessed as Tosh gaped up at the roof again. If his mind hadn’t already been made up, that would’ve done it.

He placed the pad in front of her keyboard and stood up and hoped she wouldn’t read it until after he left.

No such luck.

* * *

 

Ianto had his back pressed against the cold wall, and he was looking up Gwen’s… well. Thank god the kids were being distracted by Lucy, because this wasn’t very pretty.

“Okay, Gwen, breathe,” Ianto told her.

“I’m breathing!” she yelled.

“You have no idea what you’re doing, do you?” Jess asked from beside him. She was letting Gwen hold her hand.

“Come on, Jess, it’s me. I know everything!” He projected false confidence into his voice for both his own sake as well as Gwen’s.

“Who taught you to deliver a baby?” Jess asked.

“Uh. Worf.”

“Who’s that?” Jess asked.

“Nobody, just…” Ianto sighed as Gwen screamed again. “Focus on telling Gwen to breathe. And encouraging her.”

“I hate you both!” Gwen snarled.

“That’s wonderful, Gwen,” he said cheerfully. “You’re doing great!”

He really wished Owen was there instead of him.

* * *

 

Jack slowed down his running until he stopped. “Okay. To the left again and straight down the hall.”

He hadn’t put his gun away since Andy… since Andy. He held it in his hands and tried to make sure they didn’t shake. They couldn’t afford to have two Rhys’s on this mission; _someone_ needed to have steady hands.

They were wary of the walls now. He forced them to walk single file down the corridors, ensuring that they were in the dead centre and that nobody even went near the walls and their treacherous wires.

“That it, then?” Rhys asked. There’d been a hollow tone in the Welshman’s voice since… yeah.

Jack looked at what he was referring to. The dim red and green lights barely lit it enough to see, but at the end of the hallway lay a giant metal door.

“Should be,” Jack said.

He edged his way forward, cautious of the walls and everything else in the place. If he was honest, he would admit that the entire thing scared the shit out of him. But he didn’t have time to be scared.

“How do we open it?” Martha asked as they stood in front of it. She pushed her way to the front and looked at it.

“Careful,” Jack told her.

“Looks like there’s none of that cabling,” Martha said.

“That’s good,” Rhys said, voice flooded with relief.

“Maybe.” Jack looked down at his vortex manipulator. “Computers or whatever are definitely on the other side. We’ve just got to get through somehow. Can you see a handle or a button or something?”

Martha peered around the door. “No, I can’t.”

“Alright. Time to ask Tosh.” He pressed his comm. “Tosh?”

There wasn’t a response. He waited for a moment, thinking she was just typing something. Possibly opening the door for them. He glanced over at it, but it didn’t move.

“Tosh?”

Still no answer.

“Toshiko!”

Maybe she was just using the loo. Maybe the comms were out. Maybe she couldn’t hear him over the explosions. Maybe… oh god. He shouldn’t have left her there alone. He should’ve left her with someone. Or something. Who was he kidding, he didn’t know what he should have done.

There was a sickening noise, followed by a grunt and a groan, and Jack’s whole world ended.

“Martha?”

* * *

 

Owen halted as Tosh grabbed his arm. She held his note in her hand and shook it in his face, yelling frantically and looking very terrified.

“ _I don’t understand you,”_ he told her, even though her message was quite clear.

“ _You can’t go_!” she signed wildly. “ _You can’t do this!”_

“ _It will give you some time_.”

Maybe not much time, but enough that she could help save the world with Jack and the rest. Enough that she might live to see the new world she’d help make. And he couldn’t stand thinking about a world without her, even one he might no longer be in.

Besides, distracting the Sentries was only dangerous if they threw bombs at him. Sure, they were already bombing the hell out of the Hub, but, hey, maybe they’ll be nice and just shoot him. He could probably survive that.

Tosh didn’t seem to think so. “ _Don’t go!”_

Tears were streaming down her face, but he thought she’d never looked lovelier. He gave her a smile. “ _I’ll be alright.”_

“ _No! Please don’t do this!”_ She sobbed and said something. Maybe his name, he couldn’t tell.

“ _I’m sorry_ ,” he signed. He was. He was so, so sorry.

She opened her mouth and said what he was sure that time was his name. He reached a hand out, and she flinched back, doubtlessly unsure as to what he was doing. He gently placed his hand on her throat and he begged her with everything he had inside him to please, _please say it_.

With her tears flowing ceaselessly down her face, she said it. And he could feel it. Three syllables of vibration against his fingers. If he had a heart left to break, it would have shattered. She said it again, and again, and he knew for certain that he would’ve been crying if he still could.

He kissed her then, but it was cold and unfeeling from his dead body and that hurt more than leaving her. So, he pulled away, tried to smile, and, so he could say it back, signed something he’d learned solely for her.

“ _I love you.”_

And before he could watch her world fall around her, he dashed away and out the cog door.

He was going to save her so that she could save the planet. They should say romance _is_ dead.

* * *

 

“Martha?” Jack asked, his voice breaking along with his heart.

She slid to the floor, gasping.

“No, no, no nononono,” he said, dropping to his knees beside her. “No, Martha!”

“Hey,” she wheezed, still managing to smile up at him.

“Save your breath,” he told her hastily. “We can transport you back, alright? Just… just hold on. Please.”

“Jack,” she said knowingly, and it hurt him so much to hear. “It’s gonna be okay.”

“I should be telling you that,” he said. It came out as a sob.

 “Tell Tish I’m sorry, okay?” Her voice was so faint. “And if you see _him_ … tell him it’s not his fault. And it’s not yours.”

He shook his head rapidly. “You can’t say that. That means this is the end. It’s not. It’s not.”

“Jack,” she said, smiling.

And that was it.

Jack felt himself yelling, but it didn’t feel real. None of this was supposed to happen. He held her limp hand tight as he realized this. This… no. This was wrong, and they could fix this. They just had to reset time again.

But they couldn’t.

He closed his eyes and let himself cry.

“ _Jack_?” an equally tearful voice said in his ear. “ _Jack, are you there?”_

He shook his head. He _was_ there, but he didn’t want to be.

“Come on, mate,” Rhys said very gently beside him. “We’ve… we’ve got to keep going.”

“What for?” Jack asked.

“For Martha,” Rhys said. “Because she didn’t want you to let the world come to an end while you sat over her dead body.”

Rhys had a point. Jack sniffed back more tears and a nasty amount of snot and stood.

“Toshiko?” he said, clearing his throat.

“ _Yes_?”

She sounded worse than he did. He couldn’t ask her if she was alright, though. Too busy. Need to get this over with. Then they could deal with it. Deal with everything.

“We’re at the door. We can’t open it.”

“ _Just press the very centre of it_.”

Jack did so, and his heart broke again when it opened. Martha died trying to open it, and it had been so very simple and so very easy to open.

“Come on,” Rhys repeated, pushing him into the computer room.

“Okay, Tosh,” he said lowly. “You’re going to have to help us out. These don’t look like any computers I’ve seen.”

 _“What… what you’re going to do is go to the left most wall.”_ She was still crying.

“Done.”

“ _There should be a large, blank surface. Hit it three times_.”

“Okay.”

“ _Make sure the rest are doing this, too. It’s the same for every console._ ”

He couldn’t bring himself to tell her ‘the rest’ had turned into ‘the one.’

“Go and do what I’m doing,” he told Rhys. “Any wall.”

Rhys chose the wall across from him. “Okay. You hit it thrice?”

“Yeah. Okay, go on, Toshiko.”

“ _Now that you’ve turned it on, there should be a long string of flashing lights. Find the slowest pulsing red light and tap that.”_

He scanned the screen quickly for the slow red light. “Got it.”

“ _Fastest blue light. Hit that and then wait until the other colours change and hit it again.”_

“Next?”

_“Triple tap the purple button, and then the red one that shows up in its place.”_

“It’s not red.”

“ _Sorry, pink_.”

“Okay, I’ve done that.”

“ _This following sequence. Red, red, blue, orange, green, yellow.”_

He listed the buttons as he tapped. “Red… red… blue orange… green… and yellow.”

“ _Good. You’re done.”_

“Can you repeat it for me again? From the start?” he asked as he went to the central panel.

Thankfully, she seemed too distracted to ask why he needed to do it all over again. “ _Tap three times. Slowest red light. Faster blue. Hit it again when the colours switch.”_

“ARG!”

Jack didn’t look back. He didn’t have time to save Rhys. The best bet would be to keep going and hope whatever it was that was attacking Rhys would stop.

 “Done,” he said with a hitch in his voice. “Go on. Quickly.”

“ _Purple thrice, and again when it turns pink_.”

“Sequence?”

“ _Red, red, blue, orange, green, and yellow. And you’ve done it!”_

“Thanks, Toshiko.”

He ran to Rhys’s side, and he almost cried in relief when he realized Rhys was not covered in blood, only lying on the floor, clutching his arm.

“You alright?”

“I… dunno what counts as alright,” Rhys said through gritted teeth. “My arm hurts like hell, but I’m not dying, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Jack inspected the injured arm. Rhys hissed in pain but was otherwise a good patient. “Broken, looks like. Maybe in two parts.”

“Lucky me,” Rhys said. There wasn’t a trace of irony.

“What attacked you?”

“Bloody wiring. Saw it coming and jumped out of the way. Just not fast enough, I suppose.”

“I want to burn this place.”

“You know we can’t, Jack,” Rhys reminded him with an understanding timbre in his voice. “We don’t want these bastards to come back.”

Jack aided Rhys into a sitting position. “I’ll kill them if they do.”

“You suppose we should gather as much data to send to Tosh as possible?” Rhys asked.

“No. I have no idea what any of those flashing lights meant, so I’d have no idea what to take back with us. Besides, Toshiko should be able to access it better now, anyway, now that Sentries won’t attack us every time she does.”

“Are we sure we did it?” Rhys asked nervously. “I’d hate for all of this… to be in vain.”

“We did it. It’s over,” Jack updated him. He brought his palms to his eyes and rubbed. He was so tired. “It’s over all over.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, I was going to wait and post a chapter a day, but I'm impatient, so here you go!


	5. Chapter 5

As soon as Jack had finished thanking her, Tosh had thrown down her comm and ran. She stood, shaking, as the cog door rolled slowly open, and then dashed up the steps. The lift might’ve been the faster route, but she couldn’t stand still. She had to keep going, or else she would think, and thinking wasn’t something she wanted to do.

Practically shoving open the not-so-secret-anymore door, she stepped out into the outside world. She took a quick look around for Sentries, just to be sure, but they’d stopped bombing the minute Jack had disabled the Fenedi station.

There were clouds of billowing smoke everywhere, but they were slowly clearing. One or two things were still on fire as she walked out of the ruined tourist centre, and she coughed from the smell and the exhaust. Every few feet she stopped and glanced about her, terrified she was going to find a body. Or something less than a body. She prayed she didn’t find anything like that.

She halted halfway to the Plass, realizing she didn’t check the waters. She ran back to the tourist centre and started her walk again, this time combing the waters for anything. When she got back to where she’d stopped, she wondered if she was just stalling, because she felt the same urge to go back and start over for a second time. Pushing past the fear, she made her way to the Plass.

There was another slightly larger fire that she passed by, and it made her cough more, but that seemed to be the last one. The rest of the Plass looked relatively clear of smoke and fires, which was good. She could see better that way, and the midday light was unhindered by clouds. It would’ve been a nice day way back when nice days were important.

Kicking a chunk of pavement aside, she began her search of the Plass. She didn’t have to look very hard. In the distance, between two fallen Sentries, there Doctor Owen Harper stood.

Her feet were carrying her forward before she knew it, and she was shouting out his name excitedly. He couldn’t hear her, but she didn’t care. She was just so… _happy_. She kept yelling because she was just so relieved that she could shout something to the world without fear of being shot or exploded, and she was so happy that she could finally start living again.

As she got closer, she noticed that his back was turned to her as he examined the downed Sentries. He must’ve seen her out of the corner of his eye, though, because when she was only a few strides from him, he turned around.

She barely caught sight of his smile before she’d thrown himself into his arms, crying. This was the first time in a very long while that they were tears of joy. She pulled back and kissed him as passionately as she could.

It was by no means the ‘perfect kiss’. She was crying and that was kind of gross, and his lips were really cold, but it was better than the hasty goodbye kiss he’d given her not so long ago. But despite it all, it was the best kiss she’d had since Christmas Eve all those years ago. Hell, it was probably the best kiss she’d ever had.

When they broke apart, he grinned at her and waggled his eyebrows, and she laughed like she hadn’t laughed in a long time.

“ _You’re alive_!” she signed extatically.

“ _Not exactly_ ,” he replied, still grinning.

“ _I don’t care_ ,” she told him.

She really didn’t. He was here, and she loved him. That was all that mattered in the whole wide world, she decided as she kissed him again.

* * *

 

Jack and Rhys touched down in an empty Hub.

“Toshiko?” Jack asked as Rhys let go of him to cradle his broken arm.

She wasn’t anywhere to be found. Jack saw her stuff at her desk and assumed she’d just gone elsewhere. Maybe to alert everyone below that it was over.

“Don’t hear any Sentries,” Rhys said. “That’s a good sign.”

“Yeah.”

“Jack?”

“What?”

“She was right,” Rhys said. “It wasn’t your fault. None of it was.”

“Who says I thought it was?”

Rhys gave him a look. “Come on, I’ve lived with you over a year now, and Gwen’s told me lots of things. I know you think everything’s your fault. It’s not.”

Jack didn’t reply. He had nothing to say on the matter.

There was a shout, and Jack looked up to see people trickling in now. His heart dropped through as he saw Andy’s boyfriend, David, push through to the front, a giant smile on his face. David looked between Rhys and Jack for a moment, and then craned his neck around to look for Andy. With a confused look on his face, he turned back to Rhys and Jack, and when Rhys started to approach him, the most horrid expression crossed his face, and he stumbled back.

But that wasn’t anything compared to when Tish showed up.

She took one glance around the room, and Jack was pretty sure that that was when she figured it out, but it wasn’t until she saw Jack’s face that she lost it. He closed the space between them, and they crumpled to the ground and sobbed together.

When Jack could speak again, the only thing he could think to say was: “That’s twice she saved the world now.”

Tish merely nodded, tears still spilling down her cheeks.

“She said she was sorry,” Jack went on. “She told me to tell you that.”

“’Course she’s sorry,” Tish sniffed. “Leaving me here alone.”

“You’re not alone,” Jack said, hugging her to him. “You were there for me that year, and I’ll be here for you now.”

Tish broke down again.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the cog door roll open. Jack turned to look at it and was glad to see a beaming Tosh walk through. He didn’t expect an equally happy Owen to follow. They caught sight of him and Tish, and Tosh’s hand went to her mouth and Owen’s grin slid from his face. Tosh buried her face in Owen’s shoulder, and he wrapped his arms around her. Jack suddenly found that he wanted the same thing: to be held by someone he loved.

He gave Tish one last hug, stood up, and gazed around. He couldn’t see Ianto anywhere, so he went and stood on the stairs. Jack was a tall person, as was Ianto, but that didn’t mean it was easy to see through a crowd of over a hundred sixty people. He saw Rhys looking around too, so he signed “ _Gwen_?” at him. Rhys nodded, and Jack started scanning the crowd for both. The longer he did so, the more he worried, because he couldn’t see them anywhere.

“I can’t find her anywhere,” Rhys said worriedly, joining him at the foot of the stairs.

“They’ll be fine,” Jack muttered, more to himself than Rhys.

Movement caught his attention, and Jack watched curiously as the crowd shifted around a bit. Someone was clearing a path for themselves. Someone small. Intrigued, he watched everyone shuffle out of their way for the person, and seconds later, out popped a kid he didn’t know.

“Are you Doctor Owen?” the kid panted, looking wildly between Rhys and Jack.

“Slow down, son,” Jack told the boy. “What’s your name?”

“Jack.”

“Oh, wow,” Jack said to Jack. “I’m Jack, too!”

“That’s great, but where’s the doctor?” Jack the kid asked.

“Why?” Rhys asked quickly. “What’s wrong?”

“There’s a woman giving birth downstairs,” Jack the kid told them.

Jack the immortal observed the colour draining from Rhys’s face. “Jesus _Christ_!”

He frowned as Rhys started to run awkwardly, still cradling his arm, and then realization hit him. He sprinted from the steps to Owen and Tosh, his kid counterpart following him like a shadow.

“ _Gwen. Baby,”_ was the only thing his frazzled brain could think of.

“ _Fuck,_ ” was Owen’s equally elegant response.

They shoved themselves through the crowd to the autopsy room, and Owen started diving through drawers, slamming things around as he went. He looked absolutely flustered, and in the end, settled for a first aid kit and another box Jack hadn’t seen before. He dashed back up the stairs and past Jack, Jack, and Tosh, and plunged himself into the throng again. Jack Squared and Tosh followed closely behind.

Piling into the lift to get to the Archives, Jack found himself bouncing anxiously on the balls of his feet. What a day this was turning out to be. He saved the world, lost one of his best friends as well as a respected acquaintance, and now another one of his best friends was giving birth in the basement of the Hub. And where was Ianto?

As they stepped out of the lift and started down the corridor, Jack caught sight of Jess walking towards them. He grabbed her by the arm and stopped her.

“They’re in there,” Jess said, pointing down the hall to the furthest room.

While Jess took Jack the kid back up to the main floor of the Hub, Jack the immortal, Owen and Tosh took off sprinting to the room. Jack was going so fast that he nearly slipped rounding the corner into the room.

Jack stopped dead in the doorway as he took in the scene. Gwen was lying down on a pile of blankets and pillows, her legs bent and spread, screaming loudly. Rhys was already in the room, holding her hand with his good arm, and he was telling Gwen things like “It’s going to be fine!” and “You’re doing great!” Occasional yells from Gwen proved that this was not helping her. Ianto was leaning against the wall and looking up Gwen’s legs. He was focused, but Jack could see some disgust and confusion in his face as well.

Owen shoved past Jack, along with Tosh, and dashed to Gwen. He knelt down beside her and all but shoved Ianto to the side. Tosh started aiding Owen immediately, and Ianto slid to the side and exhaled deeply as he was relieved of his duties. That sigh started Jack’s brain again, and he rushed to Ianto immediately, dropping to his knees in front of him. Jack took Ianto’s face in his hands and just kissed every last inch of that beautiful face.

“Jack?” Ianto asked after a particularly long kiss to his forehead.

Jack, who hadn’t even realized he was crying until then, sniffed and pulled back. “Yeah?”

“You alright?” Ianto asked, concern in his eyes. “It’s just… this isn’t your usual entrance.”

He gave a watery laugh. “No, I suppose it isn’t… Ianto, you… you know that I-”

“Yeah, Jack,” Ianto said quickly. “I do.”

“Oh, FINALLY!” Gwen roared, and Ianto cracked the tiniest grin.

Anwen Martha Williams was born an hour later, and there was a lot of celebration mixed with a lot of sorrow. There was a future again, but they’d paid a great price for it. There wasn’t a child from the Hub who didn’t cry for Andy that day, and many of the newcomers sat with Tish and wept.

Nobody left the Hub for three days. The first two due to fear; Jack was concerned that there could still be Sentries left in the area and made everyone wait. The third day it rained so hard that nobody wanted to go outside. Well, except Owen.

Jack watched from the what was left of the CCTV as Owen stepped out into the driving rain and looked about him. He nodded to himself once, and then glanced up, smiling. He spread his arms wide and stood like that for a while. Tosh eventually joined Jack at the computer, and Jack wrapped his arms around her as they witnessed Owen’s moment of bliss together.

On the fourth day, it was bright and clear. Jack suggested a picnic on the Plass to Ianto. He had half expected a retort about how the Plass was not a place to have lunch, but Ianto seemed so happy to go outside again that all sarcasm was left aside.

So, there they were, Ianto lying on his back with his head in Jack’s lap and Jack leaning back with his head tilted upward to drink in all of the midday sun. It was the nicest day Jack had had in years. The lunch had been abysmal, more canned soup and frozen vegetables, but the pleasant weather and the wonderful company more than compensated for it.

“Gwen said something the other day,” Ianto stated abruptly.

Jack looked down at him. He was shielding his eyes from the sun with his hand and squinting up at Jack. To Jack, he was the most divine creature this side of the galaxy. Or any galaxy, really. He wondered if Ianto knew that, and then decided he’d tell him later in a more… private setting.

“Oh?” Jack asked.

“She asked me when the last time I was truly happy was. I told her I didn’t know.”

“Do you know now?”

“No.”

Jack shifted his weight onto one hand so that the other could play with Ianto’s soft hair. He studied Ianto’s face. “Do you think you’ll be happy again?”

Ianto considered it for a moment. “Not yet. Not after Martha and Andy.”

“Mm,” Jack said.

“But someday,” Ianto continued. “Someday, when it’s not so painful, and when everything’s okay again. Then I’ll be happy.”

“I can’t wait to see that day,” Jack replied, stroking Ianto’s cheek.

Tosh and Owen joined them later, and Owen and Ianto spent a good hour insulting each other as Jack and Tosh talked about the future. Jack honestly had no idea what was in store for them, but for once, that was okay.

It was all okay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's it! Hope you liked it! Thanks for reading!


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